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It was a long time coming. She should have seen it from the start, but being caught up in the whirlwind had been blinding. Between her father's reappearance, his debt, the money matches, Towa's sudden attraction, interest, pursuit, it was a miracle her head remained firmly on her shoulders from how much it had been spinning, if she has any right to claim such a thing. When the buffeting wind had passed, a different issue became apparent.
She knew that Towa would take it well, he would be nonchalant even. The Towa in her mind's eye said, many times now, 'oh. A shame. Well, I’ll see you at lunch tomorrow, and then in the evening at roost too. It's fine.' The real, material Towa would not be even this minimally reassuring. At least she knew he wouldn't probe.
She bit into her fingernail. She had lasted so long growing them out. It was easy at first, effortless in the blossoming romance, and then she wanted to be her best self, the best man for Towa, nails and all. The thought made her pause, diverging her mind down several avenues, and they all re-coalesced out the other side. She refused to blame him. He never explicitly made her do a single thing. He never implied, never coaxed, not like that. He asked and then he knew, and what she had got out of it all was a jumbled mess. Euphoria wasn't for her, and she wasn't for euphoria. She smiled sadly and sardonically as she acknowledged it. It was one thing to misunderstand a person, and another to misinterpret an artist. She had done both.
The weight in her stomach dropped at the sound of approaching footsteps. She must have not heard the door, and he was suddenly before her.
"I’m home," he said, as he did more often than not.
"Welcome back," she said, as she always did.
The potential of it being the final time made her swallow and her throat closed around the usual follow-up. His day didn't matter tonight, in lieu or more important matters. Was it cruel to do this after work? — he walked unceremoniously to the kitchen — cruel to whom, Towa or herself? Herself, she decided, and stood up to follow him.
"Don't drink before dinner," she called out, sensing it before she heard the pop of the bottle cap. Fussing was an outlet for her love and for a moment she wondered if she would miss this too. Towa wouldn’t. He had said as much when he had called it nagging. There was more he had said too, especially that one night, and more she had misread as a push in a direction she could not commit to following.
He was illuminated by the harsh kitchen light, pale and gaunt, though not to the extent of even a year ago. For a second, she wondered what would happen if she mentioned nothing. She could just keep him, fed and watered, clothed in mohair and leather, fulfilling her every wish and desire she never knew she had. There was no other like him.
His throat bobbed with each sip of the 2.5% beer, one of the compromises their relationship took. Undeniably, on a weekday evening, after work, at Rei's home, Towa cared this much.
"Not hungry," he explained shortly, dropping his hand with the beer to his thigh, where it would stay until he finished or tossed it. There was no drinking in the bedroom, most days.
"Neither am I," she said, her gaze dropping to Towa's less intimidating shadow.
"What is it?"
Rei remained silent.
"I won't ask again." Towa's glower was as sharp as his tone. He wasn't angry, just frustrated. If he was angry, he would have snapped, instead he spoke merely with intent. Even so, the absent mood soured between them.
"Towa," she started, and Towa waited. His patience and grace had always been something she admired about him when he wasn't impulsive and contrarian. "Can we sit down?" it was difficult to talk from the doorway of the kitchen, she excused herself with the inaudible explanation, fearing she would prematurely use up all her words otherwise.
Towa shrugged. Rei let him lead the way to the couch and he dropped to the cushions as though they were a beanbag. His beer safely sloshed in the half-empty can. Besides that Towa was silent in what Rei could not read as anticipation. Then again, she could never read him. "I wanted to talk about something." she could feel his eye on her, inquiring but not probing. If he wanted to probe he would use his voice and ask his questions, as he had done that night. He was good at that.
Rei realised once again that she did not know where to take the next arrangement of words, or what order those words went in, or indeed what they were. She had never broken up before, on account of having never dated. Rarely do people envisage breakups as part of their life plan, but it had never crossed her mind even as a possibility. A breakup. A breakup with Towa. It was one thing to lament an adolescent crush, as she had passively done throughout their recent friendship, and another to do it after everything he had done for her. Fooled by Kirihara, drowning in debt, dead in a boxing ring, a 25-year-old virgin; where would she have been without him?
In the face of the end of their relationship, all her grievances began slipping her mind. If she had ever been unhappy with Towa, she did not remember why. Her talk with Arata had been a turning point, but she was unsure of what they had actually discussed. Across the coach, Towa's gaze hurried her, intentional or not.
He seemed to realise this, or Rei was looking too much into his every gesture, as he took a casual sip of his beer, normalising the occasion away from momentous. Another day, another relationship ending. Surely this wasn't Towa's first, but given thought, she actually didn't know. It was a little too late to ask, unless she wanted to entirely derail her intentions and put this whole thing off. She could not do it all again, after this buildup.
She furrowed her brow, concentrating on thoughts of Arata. Whatever she had said, it was so vague that Rei could not outright recall anything but herself nodding, nodding, agreeing meekly. 'Yes, but he means no harm.' Arata hadn't argued, though Rei had no doubt that Junko and Honami would. Though generally on speaking, and even friendly terms with Towa, she could not forget the thin veil of their distrust of him slipping, and for some reason she had not found it entirely unwarranted.
"it's pointless," Towa said suddenly.
"Huh?"
"If it's something you want to try, this preamble is pointless." Towa had an intense, self-satisfied, easy-going smirk, which dropped immediately. "it's not that, is it?"
'Get on with it, Rei,' said his tone and 'I already know,' said his expression.
Rei had never wanted to cry in front of Towa, especially not recently, when he had set out that assortment of guidelines for her to follow. Be a man. He had never said it aloud, and had not even suggested it, but as cryptic as Towa was, Rei had inferred. Now that it was all to be over, she still didn't want to cry.
"Towa, being with you has made me so happy—"
"Is this a breakup?"
"No, it's not like..." Was it to be over immediately? It was like she had been expecting a struggle, or at least some resistance. Some emotion. An expression of desire to remain.
"From where you were going with that, it's either a breakup or proposal." He was teasing her now, aloof as ever, like there had never been love between them. Had there been? The word had never been uttered.
"It's not a proposal," Rei admitted and imagined if it had been. She would have had flowers out, a trail of petals to the bedroom. No, it wouldn't be in the flat. It wouldn't be in Shinkoumi at all. The mainland, a theme park, or garden, with champagne and dessert after. Everything she liked for herself and everything Towa never cared for. She couldn't imagine a ring on him, hers or another. Those fingers cared to wear nothing but scars, marks of his sexcapades and violent flings. He wore her violence too, though she had been careful not to leave anything permanent. Knives had been out of the question for her and any suggestion of body modification, even scarification, was too controlled for him. He detested control. Marriage was that, and so, probably, was their relationship.
"It's a breakup then," Towa said simply.
"Towa," Rei pleaded with him to understand more poorly.
Towa put his empty can down on the coffee table with a musical clink. Explanations swelled up in Rei's throat. The typical 'it's not your fault's, except she would mean them, if she had the guts, the balls to open her mouth. He turned to her, siphoning her strength again — no matter what he did or didn't do, the effect was the same. "Once more then, for the road?"
Rei stared at him in dumb silence, attempting to comprehend. This was not by any script she had been mentally following, though there were only so many things Towa would enthusiastically offer. The unwanted explanations were pushed back down with a hard swallow. What followed was even harder to say. "No, Towa."
With barely a shrug, Towa sat up, digging into a pocket for his phone. He scrolled through his messages until he found a thread with a contact Rei averted her gaze from. She didn't want to know and she had no right to now. A few quick swipes in his classic, curt style and he put the device away, on his person. "You don't have to go now," Rei assured him quickly. "it's dark outside, you can stay until morning at least. It's not like we aren't frie-"
Ignoring half of what Rei intended to say, Towa bit back with a sneer, "You think I've never been out in the dark?"
Rei let him leave. No meandering around the apartment, Towa collected nothing, leaving sketchbooks and paintbrushes and threads; all Rei's gifts. He politely put his shoes on at the entryway and moments later he was gone.