Chapter Text
All she could hear was her panting breath and a loud ring in her ears. Her chest ached at every angry in and out of air. Her hands rubbed her face angrily. She didn’t really know what she felt. Was she angry at him? Was she sad at him? Or was she feeling all of that at her? Because she knew that he was right. Yes. Maybe that was what made her mad the most. He was right, not a single word that came out of his mouth was wrong. Her brother was right, she wasn’t really improving, her art has been the same as ever, as if it reached a point of stagnation. She really does end up locking herself in her room for hours to try to finish some work, and all of those times, she ends up fainting, either for exhaustion or the lack of food and water. She does end up destroying a whole canvas when she feels it wasn’t anywhere near how she wanted it to be. And who was she kidding, the only friends she really had were Airi, Mizuki, Kanade and stubborn Mafuyu. He was right, everything he said was right!
“ IF I GIVE UP, THEN I’M BETTER OFF DEAD !”
“MAYBE YOU ARE! THEN I WOULDN’T HAVE SUCH A USELESS SISTER!”
Ena froze. Maybe… she realy was. If she will never get better, if she would never be better than father, then why bother trying? All of those years of trying her best were for naugth. Yes, that’s right. Everything was for nothing! No matter how much she tried, nothing, NOTHING was ever going her way. Her art didn’t improve. She wasn’t happy. Her father didn’t support her. Her life until now was nothing but a joke.
She looked around her room, all of her art stuff crowding everywhere. It made her sick. She quickly stumbled to her closet, rummaging her stuff until she found a bag that could fit all of her stuff. She grabbed the biggest grey gymbag she had, one that she stole from her father to be able to carry new canvas more easily. The girl shoved everything she had in that bag. Paints, brushes, canvas, pens, pencils, notebooks, everything. She panted hard, her heart beating like a drum. Through her blurry vision, she saw how her room looked… empty. It really did look like her life.Without her art, who was she?
Standing up, she grabbed the bag and opened the window, climbing on the big tree that was close. She closed the window and climbed down quietly. She would be damned if someone woke up, or worse, if she fell and had to go to the hospital for a broken bone. When the girl reached the ground, she began to run. She was finally going to end it all. She was going to throw all of the useless things away.
“ Maybe you are!”
She would make sure that she would drown it all away.
Mizuki whistled some tune from one of Niigo's songs. They were happy. An had invited them to see the small competition that her and her friends would be participating in. An was really good, that’s for sure. The girl in the pigtails and the bi-color hair boy were good as well, their voices mixed very beautifully when they sang together. Little bro wasn’t so bad either, they knew that he worked hard to get better but, for them, he was already good enough. It was fun, really, they were sad that the group couldn’t win but, hey, third place is not so bad when you go against people who had a bit more experience than you.
Anyways, they had stayed for a bit longer to help An organize some stuff back at the cafe. They were mad that Akito shoved that dutty to them and dissapeared before they could say anything. At least she could meet the other two group members that An always talked about. They shivered as the cold air of autumn brushed against their pink curls. Mizuki crossed their arms, trying to get warmer. She glanced back forward when she saw a familiar brown hair limping.
“Ena?”, yelled them as they ran towards the girl, stopping her. She looked terrible. She was pale as a ghost, eyebags bigger than she ever had, she shivered madly. Mizuki took off her coat and wrapped it around the smaller one. They frowned, why was she out so late at night, with nothing but an oversized shirt, shorts and barefoot? What was inside the bag? “Ena,”, softly started the pink one, “what are you doing out in the cold?”. The girl, who was looking at the ground the whole time, finally looked at her friend, making said one pale up.
Her eyes were bloodshot, a gaze that was void of any emotion. It made Mizuki remember Mafuyu, which was not good. “Ena?”, tried them again. They started to rub her hands on the girl’s shoulders, trying to warm her up a bit. “... I…”, started the older one, “I was going to get rid of everything”, lazily finishing the girl. The taller one hummed. “I see… so, what’s inside the bag?”. The brunette glanced at the back before staring into Mizuki’s soul. “My art materials. I don’t need them anymore. I’ll… I’ll go to the bridge and…”, trailed off the girl.
Mizuki stopped breathing. They knew what she was going to do. With a deep breath and a fake smile they said, “Ena… I… could you tell me why exactly you are going to do… that?”. “Because I can’t do anything right!”, shouted Ena, “I can’t be a good artist. I can’t be a good student. I can’t be a good friend. I can’t be a good sister. I can’t be a good daughter. Everything I do ends up being meaningless! I’m not good enough at anything! Then maybe I should just end it all”, her breathing started to become irregular. “Even Akito thinks so”, sobbed her.
Mizuki didn’t know what to do. She wasn’t good with words like Kanade was. She held the girl close, letting her sob on their chest. They picked the phone and clicked on ‘K’. “...Amiya? Why are you calling so late? I thought you couldn’t receive any calls today and-” “Can I come over?”, interrupted them. “Please, it’s an emergency. It’s about Ena.”. Kanade quickly responded. “Is she alright?”. Mizuki glanced at the girl who was still wailing on their chest. “No”, they couldn’t stop their voice from wavering. “I’ll leave the door open. I’m going to prepare something. Ah, should I call Mafuyu? I don’t know if she can come but…” “I think you should just message her. She can meet us in the morning. I think it’s safer that way.” “Alright. Take care.”, with that they hung up. The pink haired one grabbed the bag from their friend’s hand, making her look up. “Let’s get out of this cold, ok?”. The brunette hexitated, but ended up following the pink one.
The walk to Kanade’s house was silent, Mizuki didn’t dare to utter a word, afraid they would make things worse. Whatever Akito had said really shook Ena up, which was not good, since she was very emotionally unstable those days because of a recent argument she had with her father. Mizuki sighed, they really didn’t know what to do. They are not Mafuyu, who is smart enough to at least guess what happened. Nor like Kanade, who was good at calming her friends. Mizuki was just… Mizuki. Someone who is used to liying as if they were breathing. Someone who was used to pushing others away so that they wouldn’t end up getting hurt.
‘No. This isn’t time for this.’ The younger one shook lightly their head, triyng to clear their mind. The pair stopped at K’s doorstep. Mizuki squeezed Ena’s hand and knocked before opening the door. “K, we’re here.”, softly said them. Kanade appeared from the kitchen, quikly going towards the pair. She looked like a mess, tomato and soy sauce staining her hands and apron. “Ah, sorry… I… tried to make a recipe that Mochizuki taught me. Uh, I accidentally knocked over the soy sauce and, well…” sheepishly said the white haired girl. She looked at Ena and, after cleaning her hands on the apron, took the girl's hands. “Let’s sit down on the couch. I’ll bring the salad that I was preparing so that we could eat together. Ok?”
Ena barely nodded. The smaller girl gided them inside the house, telling Mizuki to lock the door for her. She made both of them sit on the couch and she went to the kitchen. The white haired girl appeared again with two bowls of salad with some meat. “Sorry if this isn’t good. I learned today so…”, she trailed off. “It’s alright, K! Are you not eating, tho?” “Ah, no. I already ate earlier.”. The brown haired girl still remained silent, tossing pieces of meat around the bowl. This made the other two share a nervous glance. Kanade rested her hand on Ena’s shoulder before saying. “Ena, if it’s not too much for you, could you tell me what happened? We want to help you.”
“...I had a fight. With Akito.” quietly said her. The other two remained silent, encouraging her to continue. “He… he didn’t tell anyone he was going to come home late, so I got worried. His phone died, I guess. So I waited and, uh, when he came I was really mad. I… yelled at him, saying that he should’ve at least warned me. He wasn’t very happy, he said that I shouldn’t be pretending to be a good sister now, ‘cause he’s always the one that takes care of me, not the other way around.”, she took a deep breath, “We… we ended up arguing more and it… got to the point that he started to say stuff about how everything I do is kind of… useless. He started talking about how I’m not a good… anything, really. It, uh, it got to the point where he started talking about my art. He said how useless everything I do is, that I’m only walking in circles and shit. How father was right , that I should just quit and have a fucking life ‘cause I suck at everythinng. I got mad , I screamed at him, saying that if I give up, then I should just die… He said that… maybe I should, so he wouldn’t have such a useless sister.” finished her with a wavering voice.
“...Ena, I-” tried Kanade before getting interrupted. “And he’s right. What was the point of this?” she pointed at the bag. “Nothing I do is enough…” “That’s not true!”, exclaimed Kanade. “You- you’re the best artist I’ve seen and, well, the best artist Niigo could ever have, and-” “DON’T LIE TO ME! I don’t need your pity. He’s right . What’s the point in trying so hard if I can't even get better?!” shouted Ena. “It’s not pity.” tried Mizuki, “We genuinely believe that you are a good artist. Do you think that if we didn’t we wouldn’t have tried to find someone else?”. Mizuki knew that they wouldn’t, even if they really neded, the group would’t try to find someone else to substitute Ena, but she didn’t need to know that. “ You are the only one that can capture the feelings that Mafuyu and Kanade want to show. You are the only one that can capture that raw desperation on everything on these musics. Don’t you get it? We don’t want, no, we don’t need another person, we already have you! So please , stop talking about yourself that way.”, ended Mizuki with a desperate voice.
Ena didn’t talk for the rest of the night, when she finished eating, Kanade offered her her room, since it was the cleanest one in the house. After she went to the bedroom, Mizuki released a long sight. “Fuck.”, cursed them. “She doesn’t believe us, does she?” “I don’t think she does.” confirmed Kanade. “I guess we should wait for Mafuyu tomorrow. To see if she can make her at least see that we care about her.” “You really think that it’ll work? ‘Cause like… Yuki’s super blunt, and it pisses off Enanan. And a lot .”
“That’s exactly why we should wait for her. She doesn’t show it really well, but she truly cares for us. If Ena doesn’t believe us, then she will believe Mafuyu. She never sugarcoats anything.” Softly said the white haired girl. Mizuki humed, “Yeah, maybe you’re rigth”. The smaller girl looked at her friend and brought her hand to their shoulder. “It’s very late, you should text your parents that you’re going to stay here.” “Oh! No, no… I don’t want to impose.” “Nonsense. It’s very late, Amiya. I won’t feel comfortable making my friend go home at this hour. I’ll get some clothes for you so you can sleep in my father’s room. Hope you don’t mind the mess.” “I don’t have a say in this, do I?”, sighed Mizuki. Kanade only smiled before entering the hallway.