Chapter Text
Thrapt [adj.]: awed at the impact someone has had on your life.
── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ──
With the arrival of September comes the arrival of uncomfortable heat, the sun's rays and humidity combined.
However, for Satoru and Suguru, the arrival of September means that their first semester of university is right around the corner. And, knowing them, they're going to be the firsts to throw a party with all sorts of concoctions of alcohol and games. It wouldn't be a Satoru or Suguru party without music blaring through speakers, however.
They can't help it—or rather, they can help it, they just choose not to—partying is in their nature. Ever since they met the right people in High School, they've been to a minimum of five house parties per semester. Even when no one is throwing house parties, they always seem to find their ways in bars or clubs, finessing their ways through ID checks and bouncers.
They're practically experts at it now, partying, getting shit-faced, being overly hype.
Satoru, in his too-full-of-himself, too cocky way, likes to call them the "life of the party," but Suguru just chuckles and brushes it off. He doesn't fully believe that that title applies to himself, but he's not going to argue with Satoru. Whatever he chooses to believe, Suguru will let him. After all, Satoru is most definitely the life of the function, even if Suguru doesn't necessarily deem himself as that.
Satoru is handsome, charming—always has been, even as a measly first year in High School. Suguru supposes it's Satoru's natural charm, his ego, and his looks that help him out in most cases. If it weren't for Satoru's eyes—so incredibly blue and hypnotizing in their nature—and his impeccably white hair, if Satoru looked like some normal, average guy like their friend Yu Haibara, then he most definitely would not be deemed as charming as he is.
They one hundred percent would not be as popular amongst their peers as they are now without Satoru's effortless charm.
Suguru doesn't realize that his name is being called until Shoko nudges his arm and he's brought out of his thoughts. Shoko gestures towards the counter top where the barista just set his drink down, and he slowly rises to his feet to grab his order. He was too caught up in his thoughts, gushing on about how charming he thinks his best friend is.
He scoffs to himself, rolling his eyes. When he rejoins the group, Shoko, Satoru, Utahime, Kento, and Yu, he intrudes in on their conversation: an upcoming Halloween bar crawl. He's intrigued, honestly, to say the least. They've never attempted a bar crawl before, of all things.
"They're going to have themed drinks," Satoru is pointing out excitedly, "so we all have to try at least one from each bar."
Across the table, Suguru watched the way Kento's face contorted into something not unlike disgust and the way he shook his head adamantly. "Who is we?" Kento asks pointedly.
Satoru cocks his head to the side, tilting his round black sunglasses down to get a proper look at Kento. "Us," he says, "together."
"I'm not really looking forward to getting liver failure this young," Yu adds. Suguru laughs through his nose, nursing on his coffee in his hands.
"It's okay, Satoru," Suguru speaks up, "you know I'll always tag along."
Utahime huffs, casting a pointed look over at Satoru, her gaze sharp. "I'm surprised you're not already in liver failure."
Satoru doesn't take her comment to heart, instead choosing to shrug it off and instead drink from his lemonade. Suguru thought it was an odd choice: opting for lemonade at a coffee shop, but then again, this is Satoru they're talking about. He's always had a knack for sweet things.
"I'm very healthy," Satoru says after a heartbeat. "You seem to overestimate how often I go out."
Utahime shrugs. "Healthy? What about all those girls you fuck, are you sure they're clean?"
Satoru barks with laughter, in the way he always does. It's loud, attracting attention from the other customers, only dying out when Satoru is out of breath. "Utahime," he chuckles, waving his hand dismissively, "you're on a roll today!"
"What does that mean?"
Satoru leans forward in his seat, glasses pushed back up the bridge of his nose, but he cranes his neck in a way that allows him to look at Utahime over them. "Oh, nothing," he says dismissively, "I'm just teasing you." He sits back in his seat, lemonade back in hand. "Anyway, I'll text the details to the group-chat. I better see you there!"
Suguru checks the time on his phone. 13:07. He slips his phone back into his pocket discreetly, taking a long look around at the people gathered at his table. His friends. He needs to get out of here by 13:30 so he can get to Tokyo General by 14:00. It'll leave him with just around two hours with his mother.
Suguru holds in an exhausted sigh. His mother. Always a tedious task, taking care of her, but he loves her regardless. He always will, not matter how badly her disease may progress. He doesn't mind caring for her, it hasn't bit into his school and extracurricular activities yet, she's still lively. She's still strong enough to get out of bed and walk around the courtyard with him, still strong enough to feed herself. But, despite all of this, he knows she's going to have her bad days. He knows that, one day, he's going to visit her and he's going to be handed bad news. However predictable that news may be, he knows it'll be hard to handle.
He hates being a pessimist, but it's gotten him this far. He always assumes the worst possible outcome, especially when the topic surrounds his mother, just in case he's not still holding out hope that she'll get better when her medical team ultimately delivers to him the news they're all waiting for with bated breath: her disease has progressed. She's not going to survive it.
He takes another look around the table at his friends. Perhaps the worst fact about all of this, which still isn't even comparable to the fact that his mother's condition might worsen, is that none of his friends are aware of his situation. He knows that when the time comes, he'll have his support system. But as that time nears, quicker and quicker every day, he doesn't have that support system. He doesn't have anyone to assure him that everything will be okay on the bad days, he doesn't have anyone to fill the empty space around his house because none of them know his mother is sick.
They're all so oblivious. Arrogant, even. And he wants to keep it that way. He doesn't want them to know the hurt of the possibility of losing someone close to them, even if they don't know his mother all that well.
He checks the time on his phone again. 13:15. Somehow, eight minutes have passed. He should get going now if he wants to make it to the station on time. Suguru stands, finishing up the last of his coffee in a few quick gulps. "I have to go now," he announces, pushing his chair back under the table, "my mother needs my help."
Satoru waves his own phone in the air, pointing to the screen. "You're coming, right?"
Suguru nods, a small smile playing at his features. "Of course, Satoru," he assures him.
"Tell Geto-san I said hello!" Satoru calls after him as Suguru parts from the group and slips out of the coffee shop.
His excuse wasn't a complete lie. His mother does need his help, but if only they knew to the extent that she needed it. It'd make his life a hundred times easier, but he prioritizes their well-being. Plus, no one even knows if her condition is going to worsen. She might be getting better right now, but until he's certain, he doesn't want to worry any of them.
The walk to the train station was short, uncomplicated. So was the process of getting on the train and taking a seat until it pulled up to the next station. The ride was short, or perhaps it was longer than he remembers it. These days, he's too caught up in his head to be certain of anything. When he reaches his destination, he steps off the train and begins his trek towards Tokyo General.
He makes great time, arriving just a few minutes before 14:00. He steps up to the front counter, greeting the nurses politely. They sign him in quickly, and before he knows it, he's already climbing the stairs to her floor.
He's never particularly been a fan of hospitals. His mother has been in and out of them since he was a child, and therefore he's also been in and out of them. They smell sterile, too clean, but there's also faint and lingering smell of chemicals. Cleaning chemicals, used to clean up the blood, feces, and whatever else spills onto the floors here.
And the hallways. They stretch long and wide, the beds lined with unused beds, crash carts, and patients and doctors walking to and fro. Sometimes, on the holidays, the halls are utterly empty. It's still filled with empty patient beds and crash carts and the people, but there's a certain air about it. Even with all the life filling it day-to-day, holidays seem to bring out the lingering aura of death that hangs over the hospital constantly.
The patients that lose their battles to their illnesses, the patients that die in surgery, the patients that succumb to their injuries. Or, worst of all, the patients barely hanging on by a thread, stuck in a lonely hospital room on their birthdays or on Christmas, when they should be with their families. Suguru knows the feeling of spending holidays at the hospital all too well.
His mother will insist that she's fine, that she has the hospital staff and other patients to keep her company during the holidays, but Suguru will stick by her side nevertheless. While his friends are all on holiday or out with their families, he sticks by his mother's side. And he's not sure he would have it any other way, just so long as he can spend as much time with her as possible before the inevitable happens.
Today is not one of those days where the hospital is gutted of all life. Today, the warm sunny glow filtering through the windows and the birds' songs give it life. The patients passing by in the hallways that send him kind, sympathetic smiles and the nurses that kindly point him in the direction of his mother's room give it life.
He knocks of the door to announce his arrival before stepping inside, making sure to close the door behind himself to allow them some sense of privacy. His mother, lying back in her bed, is looking out the window, a book sitting idly in her lap. He comes to sit at the foot of the bed, placing a gentle hand on her ankle.
"Suguru," his mother greets happily. Her voice is soft, gentle, her features are frail and luminescent in the sun. "I'm glad you could stop by today."
Suguru smiles back. "I stop by every day."
His mother returns her attention back to the book in her lap and flips a page, but he's not so sure she was finished reading it. He knows she's pretending to read now that he's here, avoiding looking at him. "Yes, well, you're getting busier now. I'm surprised you've been able to make time for me so far."
He removes his hand from her and instead opts to shove it into his pocket. He doesn't look away from her, however, even if she can't bring herself to look at him. Even after fighting her disease for so long, she still looks so beautiful. A more feminine version of himself, he's noticed as he's grown into himself over the past few years. She has the same sharp and sculpted features as he does, the same long black hair. The only differences between them being that she's a woman and he's a man.
She's diseased and he's not.
He sighs softly. "What's wrong?"
She shrugs, still pretending to be immersed in the fictional world her book provides her. "Nothing, Suguru."
"Then why won't you look at me?" He asks, harsher in his tone this time. He's trying his best to keep his resolve, but the way she's avoiding meeting his gaze, like she has something to hide. She probably does, this isn't the first time she's done this. She thinks she's protecting him by prolonging the news like this, but all it does it hurt him worse. It leaves him ignorant to the issue at hand until it's too late.
At his accusatory tone, she finally dog-ears the page of her book and closes it, slowly averting her gaze to meet his. Her eyes are duller, sadder than they were yesterday. How much have things changed since then?
"I'm getting worse, Suguru," she says at last. "I have a few months left at best."
At that moment, it felt as though the world fell out from beneath his feet. He's tried his best to be pessimistic about the whole situation, always assuming the worse so that he'd be less hurt in the end if things took a turn for the worse. Always secretly holding out hope that his mother would miraculously get better and everything would return back to normal—or as normal as things could get. The hospital and his mother's illness has always been a constant in his life.
He's always assumed the worst, believed that if he's already thought through all the worst possible outcomes, then nothing would be able to hurt him if the news was true. But now that he's actually been presented with the news that his mother is losing her battle with her disease, he's not sure how to continue on with his life.
For as long as he's been alive, they've been in and out of hospitals. She's always had this illness of hers. If she dies, Suguru will lose both constants in his life: his mother and the illness that's slowly killing her.
He's not sure how to function without either one. A life where his mother does get better and he has to adjust to a normal lifestyle, one where he doesn't spend half of his time in the hospital, will take some adjusting. But it'd be ideal.
A life where he loses both, and he has to adjust to living life outside of the hospital with no one to guide him along…
He shakes his head, choosing not to dwell on those thoughts for the time being. "No, you're… You're lying to me," he says at last. He doesn't know why he chose to say those things, like his mother is the type of person to make some sick joke out of her suffering. He shakes his head against, more fervent this time. "Please tell me this isn't true."
But his mother just averts her attention back out the window. The sunlight is gone by now, covered by the clouds. "It's not the news I wanted to hear either," she says. "I had an idea but I wasn't so sure until now—"
"No, don't say that," he cuts her off, voice hitching as he speaks. He swallows against the thick forming in his throat, sniffles back the tears that sting at his eyes. "You're fine."
His mother's smile falters. "I am," she agrees, "I have a few more months left. But I don't want you to spend those months worrying about me. I've come to terms with this fact a long time ago, Suguru."
His vision has grown blurry, marred by the tears welling up in his eyes. He blinks once, and they all spill over. "How? You're just fine with dying?"
"It's not something I've taken lightly. But I've been sick for a while," she explains. "Something like this was going to happen eventually. That, or I get better, but those chances are slim. You're too young to let yourself get caught up in all of this, baby. You have college and your friends, and—"
"But I don't want it if I can't have you." He's sobbing by now, his turmoil of emotion uncontrollable now. But he doesn't care about how disheveled he appears anymore, not when he's just found out his mother is dying. "You're my mom. I need you!"
"You have me," she says and it sounds as though she's trying to be reassuring, but he can see the way she's starting to breakdown too. Her eyes are glossed over but no tears have fallen yet. "You'll be left with the car and the house, and the money too. You'll have everything you need to get back on your feet."
"Everything except my mom! Are you sure there isn't another surgery they can do? Anymore trials? Is there something they can do?"
His mother doesn't respond. She just stares ahead at him, and it's now that he can see just how bad of a toll her disease has taken on her. Her face, her features, are all sunken in. Her body is frail, and her eyes are duller than he's ever seen them before. It looks as though her illness has sucked the life force out of her, leaving behind a shell of the woman she once used to be.
A sob escapes Suguru, echoes off of the walls of the too-sterile, too-sad hospital room. He falls forward into her arms, sobbing into her sickly pale skin, and she just holds him. She says nothing, just holds him, rubbing small and comforting circles into his back.
He thought assuming the worst would help. But now that it's here, now that he knows his mother's time is limited, he doesn't know what to do. He thought he was prepared but the feeling he's left with is something not even words could describe. It's so painful, sorrow constricting his chest until he can't do anything but gasp for air between his sobs. It feels as though the weight of the world has crashed upon his shoulders and no one else is here to help him hold it up.
Not his mother. Not his friends. There's no one else to help hold up the walls but himself.
He stays until visiting hours are over, and then some. Only leaving when his mother speaks to him in that stern, motherly tone of hers that she uses when she needs him to listen. Only then does he get up and leave her alone in that hospital room.
The halls stretch out before him, an endless walk from his mother's room to the elevator. All of the life that once used to fill this room, just hours ago, is completely void by now. This place feels like death. Complete and utter death.
And he's just supposed to, what? Leave his mother behind in here? Let her die in this shit hole?
The route that he takes home every day feels like some repetitive, mundane task. Before, he'd taken this route so many times that it felt like second-nature, a quick and simple task. Now, it feels like it takes hours to get to the train station and ride to the next stop. To walk back to their apartment, to ride the elevator up. He's sure only 40 minutes have passed in total by the time he's back inside his apartment, but it feels like a lifetime has passed by.
He doesn't have it in him to cook dinner tonight, just orders takeaway. When his food arrives, he stretches out across the sofa and turns on a show in the background to pass time, but he can't bring himself to focus on the screen in front of him right now. Not when his mother is actively dying. Not when he knows that their time left together is limited.
Of course, he knows everyone's time on Earth is limited, but it's different when it's his own mother's life that's being timed. It's different when all she's done for the past 19 years is check in and out of hospitals instead of getting to watch Suguru grow up. It's different when she hasn't even gotten to watch him graduate college, get married, and establish his life.
It's different because some disease has taken all of that away from her. From him.
Beside him, his phone buzzes to life on the cushion with an incoming call from Satoru. Suguru contemplates whether he should even answer or not. Contemplates if he's even going to tell Satoru now, now that they know what's going to happen to his mother.
In the end, he answers his phone. "Hello?" he asks, trying his best to sound as cheery and weightless as he had earlier.
"Suguru!" Satoru greets, much too energetic at this hour. But, then again, it's only 19:00. "You up to play a few games tonight?"
Suguru looks down at the takeaway box in his lap, looks over at the TV. Remembers the news his mother delivered to him today. A wave of sorrow and guilt rises up inside of him, threatens to pull him under and drown him with its ferocity, but he pushes it down as best he can. He needs to forget. He needs to let himself be happy tonight. It's what his mother would want him to do.
"Sure," he says eventually. "What're we playing?"
"Mario Kart sound good? I'm trying to get some new achievements!"
Suguru sighs, nods. "Sounds good."
They play Mario Kart together for a few hours, Satoru's incessant talking and joke cracking allowing Suguru a gateway into forgetting about all of his struggles for the time being. It's fun, playing games and being loud like this with his best friend. It's nice to be able to forget about everything, let his troubles fall into the background. Just momentarily, Satoru helps lift the world's weight off of Suguru's shoulders.
When the sun has long set beneath the horizon and the TV screen is the only thing keeping Suguru's apartment illuminated, and his eyes begin to ache from staying awake for too long, he announces his retirement to Satoru.
"Alright," Suguru says at last, "it's late and I need to be up early tomorrow. I'll see you later, yeah?"
"Awh, Suguru!" Satoru whines, but it's lighthearted enough to bring a small smile to Suguru's features. "You still coming over tomorrow?"
Suguru hums. "Probably, yeah. I'll have to ask my mom."
"You can spend the night, too, if your mom allows it. We can pull an all-nighter."
The idea amuses Suguru, but he doesn't play into it just yet. He wants to now, but is he going to want to later? When the realization that his mother is going to die soon finally hits him in all its solemn glory? "Good night, Satoru," he says instead, "I'll text you in the morning."
He hangs up the call, turns off the TV. Around him, the apartment falls dark, save for the faint lights of the city filtering in from behind the curtains. Sirens and the sound of traffic are the only sound filling the silence. Suguru's alone. Really alone. All he has now is the knowledge that, soon, it's just going to be him living here.
His mother will die in that lonely, heartless hospital room. She's going to miss all of his achievements: him graduating college, him getting his first real job, him getting married and having kids. She won't grow old, she'll die in her early forties. She'll never get to see the man she hopes he'll grow into one day.
He fights back the tears. He's already shed enough of them today. Suguru cleans up his mess in the living room and retires to his bedroom for the night, turning on a video in the background to help himself fall asleep. Except sleep doesn't come as easily as he hoped it would. The night crawls on. When he checks the time on his phone, it reads 1:00, yet it feels as though an eternity has passed since he crawled into bed.
He hates feeling this way. He enjoys being happy, enjoys feeling light and being ignorant to the struggles of the real world. He hates that, now, everything has fallen unto him. Now that his mother is for sure dying, he has to take care of their home, of their car, of feeding himself, making sure he does well in school. Suguru has only himself now. And as the night inches by, he finds himself wishing he'd told someone about his mother's illness before. Maybe then he wouldn't be so alone in this. He'd have someone to fall back onto, someone to comfort him when he feels this way.
He wishes his father were still here, but he left a long time ago when Suguru's mother's illness began to worsen and she was in the hospital more often than not. He left because he couldn't handle watching his wife die, because he was a coward. But Suguru remained strong for his mother. He took things into his own hands, being forced to grow up so quickly, and his father was long forgotten about. But it's times like these when he feels so alone in a world so big and scary that he wishes his father was still around to hold him and comfort him and tell him everything will be fine. However, it's times like these that he wishes his father were still around so all the responsibilities that comes with his mother dying will fall unto his father instead.
As selfish as it seems, it's all he wants right now. He just wants to continue being 19, being ignorant to how hard the world gets when things don't particularly favor you. He wants someone to help pick up after his mother so he doesn't have to be so alone while he does it.
He doesn't want to tell his friends—can't tell them. He doesn't want them to baby him, to look at him with pity instead of sympathy. But most of all, the part of him that had to grow up so quickly, the part of him that's become more like his mother than anything, wants to protect him from the feelings he's had the burden of taking on. Suguru wants them to be ignorant, naive even, to the hardships he's had to face so early on.
Even if that means taking on this emotional turmoil alone.
It takes a while for Suguru to fall asleep, but even then he's tireless. He tosses and turns in his sleep, unable to get even a full couple of hours worth of sleep because his mind won't quiet down enough for even just a little shuteye. The water had already been around his ankles, the floodgates cracking open, threatening to let everything through. His mother's inevitable death was all the shove needed for the gates to open wide, and now the water is at his neck.
At feels as though he's about to go under at any moment and he's not quite sure how to stop it from happening.
With October right around, Suguru and Satoru have been busy planning what exactly they're going to do for the holiday. Yesterday, Satoru mentioned a bar crawl, but now that they've a little more time to brainstorm some more ideas, they can't decide anymore. Suguru thinks they should stick to the plan they already decided on, but Satoru is insistent in the idea that they need to do something "super fun" this year.
"Have you already sent out texts for the bar crawl?" Suguru asks, idly scrolling on his phone.
"No," Satoru replies, "I wanted to wait until we had everything finalized."
"Well, what are we doing for Halloween, then?"
Satoru's smile falls as he takes a moment to think things over. Suguru watches him closely, pin pointing the exact moment an idea pops into his head. The next thing he knows, Satoru's face is lighting up, his cavansite-blue eyes glinting with unadorned excitement. "We could visit Shibuya! There'll be tons of people dressed up and shit!"
"And shit," Suguru echoes, unamused. "Not good enough. We should just throw our own party."
"Wait! Let's wait," Satoru says quickly. He continues further when Suguru shoots him an expectant look, "the semester starts in October. We should wait until we know more people at school before we throw a party. Or maybe we'll get invited to one."
Suguru hums, perplexed by this idea. "It's not bad. I guess so."
"See! I'm full of great ideas! You'd be lost without me, Suguru," Satoru says cockily, leaning over and slinging a lanky arm around Suguru's shoulders and pulling him in close. Suguru lets him, smiling softly to himself.
"I'm sure I would be," is all he says in response. He plays it off on the surface, but deep down, it's the truth. Suguru would be lost without Satoru. They've been friends for years, since their first year at high school. That's when things started to get bad for Suguru's mother and she moved into the hospital full-time while they treated her. From there, Suguru became more reliant on his friends, though he would never tell them that aloud. He started hanging out with them more, started spending the night at their houses more often.
Anything to get him out of that empty house.
When Suguru began to feel really alone, Satoru stepped in. He became the lighthouse in the fog for Suguru. And for that, he'll always be grateful for him.
"Did you ask if you can spend the night?" Satoru asks, catching Suguru off guard. Truth be told, Suguru hasn't asked his mom things like this in years. Ever since she was checked into the hospital full-time and he was forced to get along on his own, he's taken things into his own hands.
"Yeah," Suguru lies, "she said it's fine."
"Cool. My parents are away for a business trip so we have the place to ourselves."
Suguru chuckles. "What, planning to throw a party?"
Satoru rolls his eyes playfully and says, "no, but there are drinks."
"I'm down."
"Ready to go now, then?" Satoru asks.
They met each other for lunch at a mom-and-pop hibachi place tucked oddly between two larger buildings. The place is quiet, but it's nice, and the food is great. Suguru looks down at his plate, then Satoru's, noting how they're both clean of any food. Unsurprising really, considering the way they both scarfed down their food as though someone threatened to take it away from them. But now that they're finished, and with the promise of a night full of getting pissed and doing stupid shit at Satoru's place, Suguru is ready to go.
He nods. "Who's paying?"
Satoru is already holding up his card, a gleaming smile on his face. "I am. Next time is on you though."
In no time, they're stumbling into Satoru's apartment, kicking off their shoes by the door. Satoru makes a beeline for the kitchen, where he opens up the cabinets beneath the island and pulls out various bottles of alcohol. The sheer number of bottles sitting on the island before Suguru catches him by surprise, a multitude of brands and bottles, and for a split-second he begins to wonder when Satoru had the time to get all of this, and how he had the money for it all.
"Are you sure you're not a functioning alcoholic?" Suguru asks jokingly. Satoru chuckles from his position across the island, already pouring them shots of straight vodka.
"We should invite the others."
Suguru cocks his head. "Oh, so like a party? The one you said you weren't going to have?"
Satoru rolls his eyes again. "Shut up," he says. He slides Suguru's shot glass across the counter and, together, they throw them back.
The vodka is clean, crisp as it goes down Suguru's throat. He throws it back with ease, noting it's slightly sweet taste and smooth texture as it goes down. In its wake, it leaves a warm burning feeling in his chest that he finds rather satisfying to feel, and he finds himself wanting to chase that feeling.
"What are you going to college for?" Satoru asks him out of nowhere. Suguru tenses, setting his shot glass down with a sharp chime of glass against marble. College is all he's been thinking about for the past few months, but recently it's managed to slip his mind. God, he completely forgot about it. Everything's just been so fucking busy, between juggling taking care of himself and making sure he has ample time to visit his mother.
"Psychology," he says at last, fighting down the reawakened sorrow inside of him that threatens to boil up inside of him and spill out. "I just think the human mind is very interesting."
Satoru hums, looking thoughtful in his own way. "Yeah, I guess so. Not as interesting as chemistry though."
"You're not gonna get very far in chem if you can't leave the partying alone," Suguru jokes lightly.
Eventually, they move into the living room, taking up their respective spots on the sofa. A show is playing on the TV while Satoru talks away about a whole lot of nothing, but Suguru doesn't mind. The chatter is welcome, especially after a restless night spent in the deafening silence of his apartment. It's always been silent in his home, but with the new discovery of his mother's worsening illness, it was different. The silence was loud, and it was lonely. Perhaps the loneliest Suguru had ever been before.
"Do you want to cook or do you want to order in?" Satoru asks him, his voice cutting into Suguru's thoughts. He blinks, taking a moment to himself to gather his composure.
"I don't care," he decides.
Satoru sits up, eyes narrowed. Without his glasses on, his eyes look even more piercing. Suguru kind of likes them—but he doesn't particularly like the way Satoru is looking at him right now.
"What?" he asks rather accusingly.
Satoru leans in furthermore, his playful smile long gone by now. "Dude, you good?"
The question catches him off guard, takes him aback momentarily. For a split-second, Suguru suspects that Satoru might know about his mother's condition—heir parents are close, after all. His parents could have easily told him after they'd found out from his mother—but the smile curling the corners of Satoru's face now reveal to Suguru that he doesn't know.
"I'm fine," Suguru says, giving his best smile, hoping it looks as natural he wants it to be. He is good, he will be good. He just needs to forget about how is world is slowly falling apart.
Satoru stands, rounds the sofa, and pads into the kitchen. "Want another drink?" he calls from the other room. Suguru accepts immediately, and the next thing he knows, Satoru is handing him a concotion he threw together. Suguru eyes it warily but doesn't question it further, taking a sip and noting the way it was sour on his tongue, the way that sourness lingers in his throat as it goes down, and leaves that warm burning feeling in his chest.
He throws back drink after drink until he's absolutely pissed, too drunk to think too hard about anything worthwhile. Too drunk to remember his mother. Too drunk to even care in the first place. And it feels good to forget. It feels good to have that immense weight lifted off of his shoulders even if it's just temporary. Even just a little relief is better than it weighing him down constantly, or else he fears he might not be able to handle this any longer.
Beside him, Satoru is just as shit-faced as he is. His words are slurred, his usually put-together figure now disheveled: his shirt untucked and unbuttoned too low, his hair a tousled mess, unable to give a shit himself.
"Fuck," Satoru groans, "we're gonna be feeling this in the morning."
Suguru shrugs. "Fine with me."
The room goes quiet again, but the silence isn't eerie, or uncomfortable, or anything of the sort. It's nice. But the silence welcomes Suguru's thoughts, taking them in place of the would-be noise of music playing in the back, or Satoru blabbing on about whatever it is he's into at the moment. It beckons his creativity forward, allowing the thoughts that he'd previously boxed up and shoved into the back of his mind to come forward.
His eyes sting. He doesn't want to cry, but in his drunken and miserable state, he's sure he will. It's inevitable. All his thoughts come rushing in like water behind a broken levee, rushing forward with such haste that he has no time to move out of the way before he's swept up in its mess. He thought getting so drunk he couldn't think anymore would help, but he was wrong.
He thought Satoru's company was the key to fixing those broken floodgates, keeping his head above water, but he was wrong. So, so wrong.
There's really no escaping the fact that his mother is dying, and will die. He only has a few months left with her at best. What the hell is he supposed to do after she's gone? There's no way he can live on as a functioning adult without her guidance, no way he can handle all the responsibilities of the real world after she leaves him.
He wasn't even ready to graduate high school. How on earth is he going to be ready to live without her?
"Have you ever thought about what you want to do after school?" Satoru's voice cuts in, and that does it. He could have asked that question any other time and Suguru would have been fine, but now that he's holding back this angry wave of emotions and trying to keep himself as composed as possible, his words break him. Suguru drops his head into his hands, sniffling back his tears as best as possible but to no avail.
"Oh, dude…" Satoru gasps, but moves to sit closer to Suguru despite his surprise. "Sorry, I didn't know it was such a sensitive topic for you."
"It's not that," Suguru says quickly, trying to fix his mistakes, "I'm just too drunk. Makes me emotional, you know."
Satoru laughs at this. "Yeah, I get emotional too. Ready to call it a night?"
Suguru shakes his head, wiping at his face. "No, I want to stay up some more."
He doesn't miss the way Satoru hesitates. He knows what he must be thinking, that Suguru staying up in this state is a bad idea, that he needs the sleep. That they can talk about this in the morning.
Suguru's jaw clenches. He can't. He can't fucking talk about this in the morning, or ever. At some point, before he knew he was going to lose his mother, he actually considered telling his friends if they ever do find out any certain news—whether that be she gets better or not. But now that he's actually faced with that decision, he can't bring himself to do it. Not because he's ashamed of it or is selfish in the sense that he wants to keep his suffering to himself, but because he can't bring himself to talk about it.
Saying it aloud makes it feel even more real. Like if he says it aloud enough times, it'll solidify her fate. And, plus, he wants to protect his friends from this sort of pain. They shouldn't have to know what it's like to grow up so young.
"Well, I know I want to be a chemist," Satoru says quietly, an attempt to fill the silence that's now grown painfully uncomfortable between them. "But I'm going to have to lock in at school, or else I don't think I'll get very far."
"You'll do great," Suguru tells him.
"So, what? Do you want to be a psychiatrist or something?" Satoru asks in turn. Suguru knows he has good intention behind continuing the conversation despite his further outburst. He just wants Suguru to feel okay. But all it does it open the floodgates furthermore, prompting Suguru to think about his life just a few years from now.
A few years that his mother doesn't have. Suguru lets out a wretched sob, drops his head back into his hands. He took their time together for granted. All their time they could have had together, instead spent at school, or with his friends, or at home by himself.
"I don't know," Suguru admits, "I just don't know."
"I think it's time for bed," Satoru tells him. He's firm in his words now, standing to his feet and pulling Suguru to his own. "We can shower in the morning."
Suguru doesn't try to fight him on this. He just rises to his feet and lets Satoru walk him back to his bedroom. He doesn't even try to change into clean clothes either, just climbs into Satoru's bed right alongside him. A part of him expected sleep to not be so compliant tonight, but his drunken state allows him to escape into the dreamworld easily, and for that, he's grateful.