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When his mother died, body hanging limp from the ceiling, he spent days with his knees to his chest and her phone blaring in his ears.
Eventually, the housewives that would sneer at them from their balconies—the loving mothers who wouldn’t let his horrid self and their children play together—knocked on their door. But he didn’t answer. Then it was a couple of drunk customers looking for a quick fuck. And again, he didn’t answer. At last, the landlord invaded their mausoleum one day, followed by young cops with hopeful eyes. He remembers how violently their glint disappeared, when they saw the bloated disaster tied to the ceiling; how one of them threw up right next to him, before he could even notice there was a pitiful child still sitting at his dead mother’s feet.
Her funeral was just as miserable and bleak as her last few weeks, if not her entire life. Goro accepted on his knees the judgmental stares of people he had never met before. Some claimed to be family, grumbling about the sudden inconvenience. But he didn’t answer. Others were coworkers smelling of regrets and tobacco, offering him a hug, a pile of awkward words. And again, he didn’t answer. A stranger brought her lilies, and he finally felt something inside himself distort in irreparable ways. Like stars exploding at once, fragments crashing into the ground and then forgotten there.
He tried to process his grief while being pushed back and forth between houses that made him feel lost and unwanted. And after they all gave up, leaving him with hatred and curses he never learned how to scrub away, he found himself stuck in the impersonal walls of a facility, labeled a desperate case no one was ever going to adopt—rejected, rejected, rejected. By his father at birth, by the mother he innocently, stupidly revered. By his relatives, by strangers. By the entire foolish system.
In her arms, he had been the most precious thing in the world. To those adults, he wasn’t any different from a leech stealing gold. He had no value. So they discarded him in a corner, waiting for the day he would also drown in lilies, just like the mother that left him behind. Just like the mother he left behind.
In every house, in all of their eyes, he could see her flaccid body dangling from the ceiling, even in Shido’s gaze as he begged him for an opportunity. In his nightmares, in the bathroom mirror of his own small, sad apartment. In the adults who looked at him with respect and desire—he thought—because he was finally, finally able to mold himself into something useful, something valuable, something they wouldn’t abandon, maybe. Maybe.
But she wasn’t in Amamiya Ren’s gaze. She never touched his light. The first time they met, Goro was sure that boy and his smirk would be bad for business—and he was proven right. Repeatedly.
Sinners of every kind can’t allow themselves to love, or even be loved. It was true for his mother and it wound up being true for him, too. In life, that was his greatest belief.
On a cold day at the beginning of February, Goro Akechi is declared dead.
Congratulations, his past yells at him. He died as the horrid villain everyone always wanted him to be. He died, he’s gone, a bunch of people are drinking champagne in his honor—Congratulations, even his mother says.
Except Goro Akechi is only dead in theory. In practice, he’s the man awkwardly standing in front of an old electronics store, now, watching a familiar host gossip about his disappearance. The grocery bags in his hands grow heavier by the second. When the cheerful, plastic voice brings up a group of heart-stealing thieves, he goes back to his stale present.
He’s a ghost lost in the brilliant lights of Tokyo. There are cats on his way home, and he always stops to pet them. The streets are not as crowded past rush hour, so he lets himself enjoy the dying sun, the spring breeze; the silence of the little alleys leading to his small, bleak apartment.
He never left without a mask, at first. Even on his shameful late-night convenience store runs. Months later, when it became clear no one had any recollection of his face, or cared enough to let the entire world know he was still breathing, Akechi Goro stopped hiding and accepted his life, with a sigh.
He unlocks the door of his new apartment, far away from the boisterous bars in Kichijoji. He almost trips while removing his shoes, because lately his steps are not as careful, not as fearful. And after the groceries are put where they should be, and the radio comes to life to sing about love, he allows himself a cup of instant coffee, the kind Ren would scold him for drinking. But he isn’t there now, and Goro isn’t reading a book at Leblanc’s counter—he’s just staring at a wall. The blandest wall. Alone. Like most days before his death, and every single one after that.
“Thank you,” he tells the ghost of a man he’ll never meet again. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” he says, while dropping the cup into the sink.
As he waits for the microwave to warm his dinner, he talks about work, the cats he got to pet, how pretty the sky looked and how crowded the subway felt. He pretends another person is washing the dishes by his side, and he’s not the only one humming an annoying jingle. He reads his mystery novels out loud, expecting back questions he’ll never hear. When his mother’s body appears in the bathroom mirror, bloated and unloved, he pictures Ren making a joke—every fear laughed away.
Wrapped in thick blankets that never seem to give him warmth, Akechi Goro grants himself the last pathetic delusion of the day: Amamiya Ren’s texts from months ago, all the fragile questions and stupid secrets he ignored. Still in his head, they become an ongoing conversation.
Sometimes, Goro reads an old fight and pretends they’re arguing over a foolish thing he did earlier in the day. Like when he left in the morning for an odd job, feverish and pale, and wound up ungraciously collapsing on the kitchen floor later. Back then, he wanted to be scolded so bad. For a single person in the world to notice he was sick, and for them to care.
He goes over Ren’s awkward, drunken texts and dreams of rushing there, to whatever crappy place he chose as his personal hell, only to pick him up, hold him tight. His eyes linger longer on comforting words he never deserved, and yet Ren would still give him, despite all the times he proved him wrong—all the times Goro pointed a dagger at his heart, and pushed it in with barely any remorse (because it wasn’t allowed).
R. 23:02
congrats. you’ve officially been dead for two springs
R. 23:06
haunting me must be exciting
that, or you’re a revengeful shit even in death, cause i keep seeing you everywhere
And sometimes, again, Amamiya Ren texts the ghost he’s supposed to be, and Goro Akechi comes up with a hundred answers he could never type back. Still, in his head, he always pretends he does.
R. 23:38
i miss you the most at night
“I know. Me too,” he says, holding his phone tighter.
R. 23:44
i wonder if i should just try to forget you at this point?
Occasionally, his lungs struggle to let enough air in, and it hurts. So he gasps, and waits, and attempts again, and then wonders if it’s just his body reminding him he’s not supposed to be there; he’s supposed to be dead.
R. 23:46
but you’d never forgive me, would you?
that’s why you keep haunting me
It takes him hours to calm down, even longer to fall asleep. When he does, Goro collapses in a sea of nightmares, his phone pressed so tight to his chest he thinks it could send Ren all his pain, somehow. As if their hearts were still connected. As if it even mattered. Outside, sunshine announces a new day.
When Wakaba Isshiki died, her shadow reduced to dust, he spent nights with tears on his face and Shido’s chuckles ringing in his ears.
He was fifteen. Only fifteen. Yet there was already blood on his hands, so much—and he couldn’t scrub it off, no matter how hard he tried, no matter how roughly he did it. It was stuck under his fingernails. It was the metallic taste in his mouth. It was everywhere, and it tainted him to the bone, like a curse he couldn’t cleanse. Like the one he earned at birth, and that killed his mother before her.
Eventually, he stopped himself from caring about anything but revenge. Because the moment his mind wandered away from his hatred for Shido, or from all the adults who spit in his face, Goro Akechi saw his body drowning in lilies.
He never attended Wakaba Isshiki’s funeral. He couldn’t, and he certainly didn’t want to. But he often wondered, during those days, how many people cried for her, or if there even were any. If she had a son too, and if he accepted pity and disgust on his knees, just like Goro before. Then he convinced himself she didn’t leave a family behind, and no one loved her; it made his regrets burn less when all he could think about was death, or his own mother’s sad, sad gaze.
He ignored the dagger stuck into his heart and unconsciously kept running after Shido’s approval. Because he was fifteen, only fifteen—and he didn’t have anything else. He didn’t have anyone else.
He wakes up crying. For a while, he stares at the sun painting stories on the walls, before taking a deep breath and choosing to face another day.
His life as a ghost is mostly made up of odd jobs, instant coffee and the occasional cheap drink in a bar. To someone like him, forced to wear a tie before he could even understand what it meant, acting stupid and reckless is a prize. A privilege.
So there are times, like now, when he throws himself into the first tacky place he can find, the neon lights making him all dizzy and lost, and flirts with men that don’t really care about him, but they remind him of Ren, they always remind him of Ren. So it doesn’t bother him. Not too much. He stops at a kiss anyway, every time.
“Seriously?” the stranger yells at him, too close. “You won’t let me fuck you?”
He rolls his eyes. “Just go.”
Goro already knows the ending to this scene, because it’s one he has been filming over and over, for months, even though the process itself is now nauseating. The glass shards on the ground, the people smoking nearby. A guy pushing him against the brick wall, asking for more. Crying and begging, until he shows his fangs; then the stranger runs away, the credits roll, and he must find a new actor again, despite being sane enough to realize it’s useless. No one can steal Joker’s role. It’s exhausting, but it helps him survive.
When he leaves the wall, his head aching in the most ferocious way, he thinks he can catch gray eyes staring at his soul. He runs. For the hundredth time, he runs from him.
R. 03:04
hey detective, i think i saw you again tonight
R. 03:10
you always said you dont believe in ghosts, sooo how do you explain this
maybe ryuji is right
maybe i really did lose my fucking mind
R. 04:44
sometimes i think it would be so much easier
if i were given a proper chance to say goodbye
but you cant exactly hold a funeral for someone who could be idk
chilling in switzerland
thats what your fans think anyway
R. 05:03
i would do anything for that to be the truth
honestly? i would sell my soul for you
even now, akechi
When Goro wakes up, this time, he throws his phone to the floor.
The day he was declared dead, his face shining bright on a vast display, he laughed for the first time in a while. It wasn’t funny, to be honest. Ren would have cursed him out. So he smiled even harder.
But no one knocked on his door after. There were some famished calls—reporters, mostly—and the desperate texts of a man he could never let himself hold again. There were adults celebrating with caviar and champagne, and ghosts sneering in every mirror he could find—but that was it. That was it. His relatives didn’t care and his colleagues also shrugged their shoulders. Despite his change of heart, his father was too busy drowning in guilt to recall the child he had left behind. Nijima had a corrupted system to salvage, and Amamiya Ren ended up helping her with that. There was no time for the dead.
So Akechi Goro didn’t have a funeral. No lilies framing his picture. He wasn’t buried, he wasn’t mourned, and he certainly wasn’t remembered. And while part of him wasn’t surprised, because why would a monster ever deserve a perfect goodbye, the child in him felt disappointed. He knew it was a selfish desire. Most of his life, too, had depended on that—on selfish whims—but still, in the blandness of his old apartment, he dreamed of people crying for him, praying for his soul to find peace. He felt pathetic.
And now, knees tight to his chest, he’s feeling pathetic again.
R. 14:06
i’m going to tell you a secret, but you can’t laugh at me
promise?
R. 14:10
sometimes i can only fall asleep if i pretend you’re next to me
like, alive. not as a corpse
that would be too much even for me
R. 14:12
… i think
He stares at his phone blankly. “God, what the hell is wrong with you?” Goro laughs, his heart aching for someone who will never know.
R. 14:15
you’re laughing, arent you?
man akechi you’re such an asshole
“It’s not my fault you’re a lost cause,” he says, rolling his eyes. “And cursing the dead? Rude.”
R. 14:16
seriously. you’re the worst
how did i even fall in love with you
His gaze softens, and his fingers brush against those words, as if they could touch Ren himself. As if they could steal his warmth.
R. 14:30
i wish i could tell you all of this in person
i wish you had a grave
“But I don’t, do I?” He sighs, running a hand through his hair. “I wonder when you’ll give up on that.”
R. 14:34
you once told me you like lilies
so i think if you had a grave, i would bring you a bouquet of lilies
every day
R. 14:36
i want to see you happy
He pushes his phone aside and shoves his face in his hands. While crying his heart out, Goro pretends he does have a grave. That he’s the happiest ghost, the fucking happiest, because he has Amamiya Ren’s warmth and his stupid sea of lilies. And he tells himself he’d be alright with dying, if it meant the love of his life—his greatest sin—could remember him properly. Could mourn him properly. But Ren can’t do that, though, because there’s still no grave, no epitaph. Nothing. Goro Akechi is dead, in theory. In practice, one could argue he never existed.
He leaves his bed and walks to the kitchen sink to wash his face, exhausted—he doesn’t want to meet his mother today.
“I also want to see you happy, you know,” Goro tells the ghost who has been haunting him for months. If he weren’t such a boring realist, he’d really believe Amamiya Ren is there, now, sitting on his counter, beautiful and bright. Warm. Like the sunbeams seeping through the half-broken shutters behind them.
“I’m sure you’d bring me the prettiest lilies,” he says, his hand reaching for soft, familiar curls, only to find nothing. Like always. “You fool.”
When Goro was still alive, on those rare occasions he left his office early, and Shido didn’t demand a last-minute murder, he liked indulging Ren. He liked waiting outside Rafflesia for his shift to be over, to rest his gaze on his back, and he loved how much Ren shivered and burned every time he caught one of his subtle mistakes. The thought of his cheeks glowing pink makes him smile.
There would always be a small bouquet in his hands, at the end.
He didn’t have feelings for Amamiya Ren, then. Not yet. Their childish flirting was just a way to burn daylight, a stupid whim. The most ridiculous diversion from how draining his life had gotten, with all the cases and blood stains. But between those frivolous moments and the night before his death, Akechi Goro’s heart started beating again, and growing, and craving something more than pain and revenge. Something Ren called ‘love’, once, while kissing him fervently against Leblanc’s counter. Their first and last time.
He tucks a strand of hair behind his ear. The ghost disappears.
R. 02:11
i’m sorry for texting you so much
i know it’s more than usual. it must be annoying
R. 02:22
i don’t really feel like myself these days
i always thought the anniversary of your death would be the second hardest day of my life
R. 02:24
turns out watching the world move on, watching spring come again
without you here. alive
god it’s one of the most painful things i’ve ever gone through
R. 03:35
sometimes
i wonder if you regretted not accepting maruki’s deal, in those last moments
R. 04:49
i’ll wait for you in my dreams
He isn’t sure he slept. He thinks he closed his eyes, at a certain point, but there was so much going on in his head—so much noise—that Goro can’t tell whether he rested. From the comfort of his bed, he stares at the figures the early morning sun keeps drawing on his ceiling.
He doesn’t like how much Amamiya Ren has been texting him recently. Every time there’s a soft buzz coming from his phone, he feels the urge to dig his fingers deep into his own chest, grab his heart and shake it hard enough for it to gain back some common sense.
Ren is still his greatest sin. His ghost, his sentimental texts—he’s the only comfort Goro has ever craved so desperately, and the sole thing in this world he can never allow himself. But that’s also always been Akechi Goro’s issue: his concessions are stupid, and simple, and stuff any other person wouldn’t even consider a huge treat, like a coffee cup or the chance to pet a cat. To him, accepting Ren’s heart feels impossible. Like a fool winning the lottery, just to give the prize to someone else, because coming first doesn’t seem fair.
Still, Goro wants him. In his own complicated, twisted way, Goro wants him. He reads his recent texts over and over, until he can recite them with his eyes closed. He wonders if Ren met his shadow in a dream, eventually.
Ever since his death, his mornings have been dull, but maybe that’s a good thing. His phone doesn’t ring as much, there are fewer documents contaminating his desk, and even the smell of blood is fainter than before. He drinks his instant coffee while sitting at the kitchen table. He listens to the news. If he doesn’t have work or books to read or laundry to do, he lets himself think about Ren, too. Briefly, softly. Against his better judgment. But as soon as his mother’s bloated corpse appears in a corner, or Wakaba Isshiki’s black dust seeps through the shutters, he puts his love away and goes back to his regrets. It’s routine, at this point.
And he wouldn’t mind too much, usually, if not for his phone still burning in his pocket.
Goro thinks, while staring at his lunch in the microwave, about the moment he realized he wasn’t dead. He spent his previous life between fearing lilies and wishing to drown in them, yet when the end didn’t come, despite promising to do so, he felt relieved. Even as a voice kept telling him it was unfair, there were supposed to be flowers filling his lungs, he smiled wide and thanked his heart for staying strong.
His fingertips almost burn when he takes out the little container. Instant curry bought at the mart can’t be as good as Leblanc’s secret recipe, but it’s better than nothing. Still, every bite tastes wrong in his mouth, and he tries not to blame his thoughts for it.
Curry also happened to be his first craving, that day. Then Goro Akechi realized, already gravitating towards the café, that Fate had given him an opportunity to scrub himself off Amamiya Ren’s life. To let him be happy, and save them both from a catastrophe. So he turned around, despite his gloved hand almost reaching the door, and went back to his miserable life and his dismal apartment. Alone.
He drops the container in the sink and goes to bed. It’s not a good day. He doesn’t want to care anymore.
He wakes up in the middle of the night to Ren’s ghost—illusion—brushing his hair.
“Leave me alone,” he groans, facing away.
“But you’re already alone, aren’t you?” The spirit laughs. “You’ve always been.”
Goro looks at him for a moment. “Just go, Ren. Please.”
And then he leaves.
R. 00:44
sometimes i think you’re still haunting me cause you don’t know where to go
but like maybe if SOMEONE had a grave…
R. 02:31
akechi
do you want to hear a funny story?
R. 02:34
basically mishima kept bothering me yesterday
and i don’t remember which part of his rant annoyed me the most
i just know i exploded all of a sudden
R. 02:38
and eventually i told him something like
“mishima i’m quite literally living like the hysterical wife of a missing soldier can you please let me fuck off for once”
and akechi. he gave me his therapist’s number
R. 02:49
you’re probably thinking i’m a lost cause, aren’t you
god i’m so fucking pathetic now
R. 04:58
i will always love you, crow
On a pretty day at the beginning of June, more than a year after his death, Akechi Goro decides to arrange his own funeral. Not for himself, but for Amamiya Ren.
He wakes up before the sun. He ignores his mother’s corpse in the bathroom mirror. He circles the date on the calendar, and drinks instant coffee from the usual white cup. Everything is as it should be, except for the fact Ren hasn’t texted him in months, that Goro is busy picking where to place his grave, and his heart has been drowning in anguish for the past several weeks. Still, he strides forward.
He feeds a couple of stray cats that remind him of Ren. He asks the florist to give him the prettiest lilies she can spare, and even buys himself a small cupcake. When he gets home, finally, after wandering around for hours, Goro Akechi sits at the table of his modest kitchen—with a sigh—and writes an address on scented paper.
The funeral is only a formality. He knows. And his heart won’t stop beating at once just because there’s a fake grave, somewhere, showing his name and a foolish epitaph. He knows this, too. But Goro’s fingers still quiver as he places the card in a white, impersonal envelope. And everything aches and twists even further when he drops it at Leblanc’s door, later, while pretending the sign alone isn’t enough to steal his breath.
On his way to the afterlife, Goro holds the lilies tight to his chest.
Amamiya Ren spent months begging him for one last goodbye. Months asking for a grave to visit, for concrete proof he had been alive, at a certain point, and he wasn’t simply an illusion, rumors teenagers would giggle over. Months talking to a ghost through texts.
They both know he was just imploring Goro to come back, in reality. That a funeral would never matter. What Amamiya Ren desperately wanted, and still does, was to feel his warmth again. But to the world, Goro Akechi is dead, and there is nothing the Phantom Thieves—Joker—can do about it. They both know this, too. So they should have moved on already, they should be living beautiful, brilliant lives away from each other—except they aren’t, his heart thinks, despite the gross amount of lies he tells himself.
After Ren’s sentimental texts stopped, sometime that spring, he admitted to his soul he couldn’t do it anymore. Against his better judgment, Goro Akechi decided to indulge him one last time, to give him the only gift he could afford. Like when he would leave work earlier, back when he was still alive, just to pick Ren up from his stupid shift, receive his stupid flowers, and enjoy the stupid satisfied grin on his face. Like when things felt easier, even though they weren’t, they never were.
R. 15:34
please tell me it’s from you
R. 15:40
please. i’m at my limit.
i’d set the world on fire just for this small hope
The place he chooses for his end is surprisingly lovely. There’s a vast, gorgeous stretch of greenery, decked with flowers of every kind. The waves sing, at the bottom of the cliff. They remind him of the jazz club in Kichijoji, of Ren’s fingers tapping on the table, his laugh, the way he would always hum along despite not knowing the song. Goro’s beautiful, beautiful sin, maybe still waiting for him in front of that stage.
This heaven is for him. This corner of the world where every curse seems to be forgiven, where the waves rage for love and the flowers promise hope—he picked it for him. His last, stupid gift to the only man who made him trust the future.
“Alright,” he says, with the wind tousling his hair. “We don’t want to run into him, do we? Let’s get this over quickly.”
He looks for small rocks all around, till he’s gathered enough to form a pile.
“This is for you, mom,” Goro whispers, placing the first one down, almost at the end of the cliff. “Thank you… for letting me live, I guess.”
The breeze kisses his cheeks, but he doesn’t cry. “I’m not mad at you. I’ll never be, mom. I know you tried your best. He—Ren used to say it wasn’t my fault, that you were fighting against monsters stronger than the both of us, but sometimes, still…” He takes a deep, deep breath. “In my next life, I promise I’ll grow up as a hero and save you, mom. We’ll be happy. Even a little bit will be enough.”
Goro glances at the sun for a moment. Then, soft smile on his lips, “Goodbye, mom.”
The next rock goes to her side. It’s just as big, and just as heavy on his shoulders.
“I didn’t know you had a daughter,” he says, voice low and fragile. “Not that it would have changed anything.”
He thinks the waves sound a bit louder and harsher than before, but in the way a mother’s worried hug would feel. It’s what he wants to believe, anyway. He can only digest this guilt if he tells himself there will be peace, at the end, and not just the undiluted rage he has already been consuming for years. The wind is playful, still. But again, Goro doesn’t cry.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I thought—I just wanted him to see me, I wanted to ruin his future the same fucking way he demolished mine, and that of my mother. I wanted to be ugly and unfair, like the rest of the world had been to me, but you… you didn’t deserve to be involved. I’m really sorry,” he breathes out, running a hand through his hair. “I’ll never forget you, I swear. I fucking swear. This guilt will always be part of my heart, even after death. It’s the least I can do.”
More rocks are added to the pile, slowly, each reminding him of people he left behind, that left him behind; wounds he always refused to face, and that now are engulfing him en masse. A disaster of burning scars, bringing him to life.
“Shido,” he says, another rock tight in his fingers. “You’re only alive because there are still good people in this world.”
Goro places it at the very top of the heap, the last missing piece to his castle of regrets.
“But I’m not one of them, so I want you to know you’ll never be forgiven. I will never forgive you. I won’t drag you to Hell, but I’ll be there waiting for you, because I hate you, I hate you, I fucking hate you.” He almost tears his own chest open. “And I hate the stupid child in me who still wishes you were his dad. I… God, Shido, that’s all I fucking wanted—to have a dad. To have someone. And you didn’t give a shit.”
Goro’s laugh is filled with poison, and he has to fight the urge to throw his heart into the ocean. When he leaves the ground, slowly, with the rocks staring back at his squalor, he almost cries. Almost. His fingers run to his face before he can falter.
“Okay,” he says, setting the lilies down. “Okay. It’s okay. I need to go.”
“I’m sorry,” someone says, then.
Goro doesn’t turn around. The world threatens to fall.
“I forgot them. The lilies.”
And the waves rage. He’s crying, his heart is crying, finally, and he doesn’t know how to stop. But he brushes every single tear away, all of them, with his shaking fingers, his sleeves, because he can’t let his love see him like that—he can’t let his love see him.
“It’s okay,” he says, the most vulnerable he’s ever been. “I wasn’t expecting you anyway.”
“You thought I wouldn’t come?”
“I thought I’d leave before you did.”
“Akechi,” Ren whispers. His arms are gentle around Goro’s quivering body, they’re patient. They’re warm. “Hi. There was no time on the card.”
“I know.” He can see his present fracture into pieces.
“You know, uh?”
Ren holds him tighter, with care Goro still thinks he doesn’t deserve, but he can’t push him away, he can’t—he hasn’t felt this precious in someone’s embrace ever since his mother’s death. Like there’s worth in his life, even if he has nothing to give back. Even if he’s just a pile of mistakes.
When Ren turns him around, suddenly, he realizes they have both been crying the whole time. That Amamiya Ren is a fragile mess in his arms, not a fearless hero, and his heart is puking up the most debilitating pain. His fingers are desperate, they’re relentless, they need to make sure Goro is alive, he’s real, he’s there—and so they dig into skin, draw motions on his back, and move to his hips, his legs.
“Joker.” He kisses his head, while playing with unruly curls. “You’ll devour me.”
“I want to devour you,” Ren says, his eyes trying to steal whatever piece of soul they can find. “Maybe you won’t leave again, if I do.”
Goro struggles to detangle his thoughts. “I can’t stay here. I can’t be with you.”
“Then tell me you don’t want to be with me.” Ren grabs his chin.
“Joker.”
“Tell me you don’t give a shit,” he says, leaving a soft kiss on his jaw. “You just sent the card to mock me.” Against his cheek. “And you don’t love me.”
“Please.”
Their lips meet, then. Desperately. Fervently. Like the first time, and all those in Akechi’s most delusional dreams. Like they’re back against Leblanc’s counter, with the Tv humming in the background, the scent of coffee beans, that overwhelming warmth nothing else ever gave him, after death.
“Tell me this means nothing to you, and I’ll leave. You’ll keep pretending to be dead and I’ll never meet you again,” Ren wheezes, licking his mouth. “Tell me, Crow.”
But Goro doesn’t reply. He’s not sure his heart is still beating. It’s just all too sudden and confusing and warm—he’ll never grow tired of that, the intimacy, the burning. He can’t fight it, even if it means drowning in lilies. Because he’s always been cold, to the point sometimes he doubted he was alive, and reason can’t win against his natural urge to kiss the sun. His sun.
Ren is quiet for a while, but doesn’t let go. There’s a beautifully complicated glint in his eyes, as if he were hiding a million thoughts, and every secret in the world. He kisses him again, eventually, and then again, again, and again. Each kiss more doting than the last.
“This is your funeral, right?” he whispers next to his ear. “Can I say something?”
Goro nods, slowly. Afraid. The little voice in his head tells him Ren is tired of waiting for his weak self, so he’s going to say goodbye, he’s going to leave him behind. His sun is going to fall.
“Good.” Ren grins, but the more distance between them, the more he feels on the brink of death. He watches him kneel down to pick a single lily.
“Goro Akechi was—sorry, that’s not how you start a eulogy, is it? I’ve never been to a funeral.” Ren laughs, and sunshine kisses his face.
He shakes his head. “It’s fine.”
“My name is Amamiya Ren,” he says, standing. “And Goro Akechi was the love of my life.”
The wind makes them both shiver.
“To the world, he was brilliant and bold. You see, dear flowers, he gave the impression you’d never be able to touch him—he just constantly went around with this stupid plastic smile on his face. Felt so unnerving.” Ren chuckles, keeping the lily pressed to his chest. “He was… this impossible game I wanted to solve. I spent months trying to guess his favorite coffee order. I’m sure he wasn’t even aware he liked it sweet. I overwhelmed him with questions every time I saw him holding a new book, and you can’t imagine how often I had to fight the urge to just stop his annoying rants with a kiss.”
Goro laughs too, this time. Something soft blooms in Ren’s gaze.
“Dear flowers, to me Goro Akechi was a disaster. He was an absolute idiot. He acted like he owed Death a huge debt, and that he wasn’t afraid of the end, all while trembling and—trembling. Oh. Right, he would always tremble. Even in my arms, he felt so scared.” Ren pauses for a while, he takes a deep breath. “I kept thinking about it after he died. How scared he looked, the things I could have done to protect him, to save him.”
“Ren...?”
Goro watches the man he loves go from the temporary bold, shit-eating grin sunshine he became at the beginning of that speech, to a fragile little thing. The gray of his eyes reflects an ocean of despair. He wants to hug him. He wants to embrace him tight. He wants it, he really does—but he can’t move. And the waves scream.
“If Goro Akechi were still alive… I’d tell him he already paid off his debts,” Ren cries, softly, but he never looks away. He never leaves him behind. “I’d tell him he suffered enough, and I want him back. I need him back. Whatever kind of fucked up punishment he thinks he deserves, I at least want to be there to hold his hand. I… can’t he fight for himself, for once? Can’t he—God, Akechi, can’t you be selfish for your fucking self? Not to avenge someone. Not for the world.”
Goro is stunned. He’s not exactly sure what he should say, or how he’s even supposed to react. There are stars glinting in his eyes, and too many feelings escaping his heart.
He never conceded himself anything. Every step forward, every blood stain on his perfect leather gloves, was for his mother, his father, for a world he learned he could appreciate, eventually, and even wished to save, at a certain point. He was selfish to protect what he considered his own brand of justice. But he never cared about what could have been good for him—and there it was his sun, instead, telling Akechi to grant himself a wish. As if he weren’t a monster, as if life could still give him a future. His voice was sincere, though. It was pure.
To Goro, that’s the most unnerving thing of all.
He grabs his light with his own hands, then, arms hiding Ren into the warmest embrace he can give. He’s gentle when he kisses his cheek, even kinder while brushing those curls.
Goro Akechi thinks, while letting their lips meet, that he just wants to indulge him again. That Amamiya Ren might be blinded by his feelings, he might not be telling the full truth about what kind of man he is, but still—Goro wants to spoil him, in a different way. If he’s going to love the sun, he’ll simply allow himself to be a devoted flower. If he’s going to live, he’ll bloom into the warm love Amamiya Ren deserves. It feels unfair to the dead, and yet his heart is beating, and he can’t stop burning, he can’t stop wanting him, he can’t. He never will.
Ren pulls back slightly. His gaze seems a bit unsure, but he smiles anyway. Sunshine caresses their faces. His fingers don’t falter while offering Goro the single lily from before.
“Will you accept my heart, this time?” He says, with the wind tousling his hair.
“I will. I do.”