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Drip, drip, drip.
The tub is overflowing. The tap is closed, but it leaks anyway. Drip, drip, there is too much here; Kanata had dunked his head under the water but it only left him unable to breathe, his mind still scrambling to make sense of the disconnect between his life and his reality.
( if a star falls from the sky, if the god does not exist, what then what then what then— )
It is easier, outside. Where that boy can hold his hand and help him make sense of the world and Kanata will remember that he is human.
Human.
He is not human here. They do not want him to be. Their wishes clash against his reality.
He is their god, beautiful and inhuman. His mother is the waves and he is a child of the ocean, the water that spills from the bathtub everytime he rocks his body is barely an echo of her hold and gods do not wish but Kanata wants and—
( what does he want? )
—he climbs out of the tub.
The water spills onto the bathroom floor.
Kanata falls to the floor, too, soaking and trembling. The water was cold. He's used to it, but his body shivers regardless.
There are scissors near the sink. Not his. He took it from school. Hid it in his uniform. They do not keep sharp objects near him, lest their god get injured.
There is nothing left of them now, though, are there? Kanata has been proven a phony, he has learned that his heart beats, it has been days-weeks-months and he still has trouble making sense of it all when he is alone with his own mind.
It is tiring. Kanata is still tired. He has been tired for a long time. He hates how it comes back, this awful, twisting, coiling feeling inside him.
He stumbles to the sink and his reflection peers back at him. Do gods look like this? Dripping wet and hollowed out. Perhaps they do, perhaps gods are meant to be as terrifying as ocean storms, much like his mother's ice-cold eyes, no matter how much they try to make him beautiful.
Gods. Beautiful and monstrous. Kanata wants to claw his skin off. Maybe the real monster is underneath.
He wonders, briefly, if his mother ever felt like this, if his mother ever considered humanity before he became god and she had to leave. If she ever wanted to be his mother instead of god. These are thoughts he disregards as quickly as they come.
Blue locks fall into his face. It really is troublesome to have them this long. He picks up the scissors. Lifts it. Wonders how it would feel to lose this weight.
Snip.
Mikejima cut his hair most often. Of course, the people in his household could always do it, but… Kanata liked it. When Mikejima did it for him.
He'd brush Kanata's hair first. Carefully, all so he does not cause any pain, until there are no tangles left. He was careful with the scissors, too. He never cut too much. Just enough to keep Kanata looking neat.
“Looking good, Kanata-san.” Mikejima's fingers combed through the blue locks while Kanata simply hummed, trusting the other boy with the action as much as he trusted anything Mikejima did for him.
“Good?”
He would smile at Kanata, warm and soft and gentle and loving, feelings Kanata had yet to even begin to understand. “Beautiful.”
( It was nice, wasn't it?
It was nice, but—was that ever him? Did any of it matter, if Kanata had been a fake-phony-liar this whole time, a monster incapable of understanding any human around him? Alone, he's still that monster, that's simply a fact.
So he can't understand why his hands can't stop shaking. Why his eyes refuse to stop leaking.
Why he can't seem to decide why he wants to be, faltering after one cut. His hand feels too heavy to lift. )
Madara found him in the bathroom. A rush of panic filled him the moment he took in the sight before him; the overflowing tub, the boy slumped on the ground, the scissors in his hand. His only relief was that there was no red mixed into the scene. No—only locks of blue hair, haphazardly hacked at before Kanata had... he didn't know.
“Kanata-san.” His voice is quiet, approaching him much like how he would an injured animal. “It's me.”
No reaction. Madara has a moment to wonder if the other is even conscious before slowly, slowly, green eyes open to look at him. They're eerily blank. Empty. Madara hasn't seen Kanata like this since things took a turn for the worst and the anger in him coiled into something even darker, but that can wait.
“Kanata-san, I'm going to come closer.”
Still nothing.
Madara suppresses a wave of something ugly and heavy, nails digging into his palm as they curl into fists. He breathes out and loosens them, his feelings can't come first right now.
He needs to get the scissors away. He taps Kanata's hand and the boy shivers so terribly Madara is scared he spooked him. Madara's known for his brashness, loud and bright and forcibly taking up space, but right now he's trying to make himself as quiet as possible.
"Please, Kanata-san," he pleads. "Can I have that?" Kanata blinks like he didn't even realize he was holding the scissors. They clatter to the ground and Madara picks them up and tucks them away as quickly as possible.
That's good. It means Kanata is aware of him, at least. He's not moving away from him, either, something Madara would have expected with how often he'd had to leave the other boy lately. At school, where Morisawa Chiaki is present to watch over him, this is no trouble, but…
Madara is all too familiar with loneliness.
"I'll get towels for you, alright?" Kanata doesn't say anything, so Madara gets up, an eye on him the entire time.
He wraps a soft towel around Kanata—he'll need to get him out of those wet clothes, too—and is lifting another to dry his hair when Kanata's hand suddenly grabs his wrist. "No," his soft voice mumbles, green eyes glimmering with something entirely new and painful all the same.
Ah. He's crying.
Madara swallows his frown, swallows the urge to fight who caused this because that's the easiest thing to do, and lowers the towel. He gazes at Kanata's hair then, a part of it chopped off already. He reaches and Kanata lets him, playing with the shorter ends.
Kanata's voice, trembling, admits, "I don't want it."
Madara freezes.
"I don't want it," Kanata repeats. "I…"
That means so many things, doesn't it? It—his hair, being a god, whatever pain is plaguing him right now. It's a want, more importantly. It's the very humanity Madara had fought for him to be allowed to have.
Should Madara cut away these invisible threads binding him, while he's here? "Do you want me to cut it for you?"
Green eyes meet his, staring and staring. They're not blank anymore, but swimming with so much emotion it's taking Madara off-guard. Finally, Kanata nods.
"Alright! Mama will take care of it for you!" Just like he'd take care of everything Kanata needed as long as he could, no matter what the other wanted, or what himself wanted. He pulls out those scissors again and gets to work. Snip, snip, snip, it's almost too easy. It's just hair, after all. Compared to everything else, it's nothing.
Yet a part of him aches. Awful, isn't it? He still finds beauty in Kanata's appearance, a part of him hurts doing this, even when it's exactly what Kanata asked of him. He feels like he's ruining him. It's awful that a part of him can't help but revere Kanata.
He gets through it either way. Kanata stays perfectly still the whole time, eyes drifting to somewhere Madara can't reach.
There are things he can't just break his way through, in the end.
Right now, he just…
He cups Kanata's face. Kanata blinks and he's here again, looking at Madara. It's quiet and no one has come to even try to bother them. It's just them and it would be so easy to pretend Madara can close the distance between them.
But he knows he's temporary. He knows he's given up on any sort of real connection between them. He knows he'll be swept away and have to run to another country, another matter to deal with.
The shorter hair makes Kanata look rounder, more open. "Beautiful," Madara whispers.
Kanata leans into his hand, or maybe Madara imagines that he does.
He pulls his hand away.
"Let's get you dried up, okay?"
He steps back and gets up, ready to get dry clothes for Kanata to wear, then a hand tugs on his sleeve. Kanata's eyes are warmer, like this was something he actually needed.
"Thank you, Mikejima."