Work Text:
“I love remembering. More than living. What's the difference anyway?”
La voce della luna (1990, Federico Fellini)
Reo tried changing the furniture in the couple’s apartment. Once. He initially suggested hiring a cleaning service (there were mothballs, dust bunnies, and even the clothes were smelling of mildew and sweat). Nagi stopped cleaning not long after Isagi’s departure. The apartment was in shambles, their homey 4DLK was covered with a thin layer of dust and stunk of sticky summer heat. Yet only it appeared as though only Isagi’s half of the place was untouched.
Reo walked over Nagi’s clothing, tip-toeing over them until he spotted Nagi holding Isagi’s Bastard Muchen’s jersey. Nagi was staring deeply at the piece of clothing as if it could ease his worries and soothe his aching. His hands twirled and danced around the shirt, careful not to fray the material, and with a big gulp he swallowed the aging scent of his lover.
Again.
At this point, almost all of Isagi’s clothing scent faded, aged like the wearer, and instead, a soft laundry-like smell replaced its gentle fragrance. If Reo peered closer, he could see a slight seen of dust lying on Nagi’s snow hair.
“Nagi.” Reo started, the room was a ghastly light grey; the curtains were drawn closed.
“Yoichi will come back,” Nagi said with the sort of determination only reserved for Isagi, his empty gaze stared at him.
Reo rubbed the space between his thin eyebrows. This again. Already Nagi kept sounding like a broken clock, he kept repeating that Isagi will come back to him, to his home, to life again. Reo sighed which felt like the millionth time, he let Nagi continue his mirage. Reo looked at the state of Nagi’s apartment, he can’t continue living like this anymore. It’s unhealthy and it’s going to make him feel worse too.
“I can hire some cleaning help.”
Nagi didn't turn his head towards him, still eyeing the entrance.
Oh. Nagi was still looking at him…no he wasn’t looking at him. Reo bit his cracked lips. He was staring at the door where Yoichi would come in. He was seeing through him.
Already the air felt suffocating, the humidity settled unpleasantly on his skin. He brushed the feeling away and brought a handkerchief out and wiped the sweat off of his arms.
“Only the kitchen, living room, and bathroom. Your’s and Isagi’s room will be ignored. Come on,” “No, Yoichi and I share the cleaning duties. We were planning to retile the bathroom. Say, Reo what color do you think is better coastal blue or mint? Isagi wants coastal blue but I personally think baby blue suits his eyes more.”
Reo puffed out a tired breath. This again? Oh well, he can continue Nagi’s little games if it meant he could be agreeable enough to clean the place.
“Yeah, I think baby blue is nice.” Nagi’s eyes softened.
“I think so too.”
After calling the calling services, Reo patted his phone on his pants. At least Nagi was going in the right direction. He sat on their creamy sofa and dug himself deeper into its warmth. The cleaning people came as fast as they said. He told them where to clean and be gentle but everything went wrong when Nagi walked in, carrying Isagi’s jersey like a safety blanket.
And all the progress was out the window.
Nagi was never an angry man, he was more of the opposite. Impartial to most things. But the second he saw one of the cleaners touch Isagi’s side of the sofa (his mocha creme pillow) he yelled at them to leave.
The shouting unsettled Reo. It sparked something deep inside him that he thought was gone from hours and hours of therapy and counseling visits. Visions of his parents were seared into his brain as he watched Nagi verbally harass the crew to leave and never come.
They turned towards Reo but all he could was nod.
“I'll pay for the fees. Please go”
Nagi's attention turned towards him when the door closed. And a fervent breeze entered the still room.
“Why were they here?”
Reo turned away. His heart was beating through his chest and it wasn't the kind that usually when he was near Nagi.
“To clean. I called them.” Nagi’s eyebrows furrowed.
“Why?” “To clean, look I didn't know they would–”
“Never call them again.”
“Alright.” said Reo, giving in and letting the dust settle into the confines of his lungs.
__________________________________________
At first, Chigiri suggested counseling and Bachira agreed, but Reo countered. It's still too early and he isn't in the right mind space to talk or relive everything.
“It's been 6 months Reo. If someone doesn't break it to him that Isagi is gone then he would continue living in delusion.”
“And what's wrong with that?” “Reo. He can live as he is. He needs to wake up and know.”
Reo stared at his hands. His nails were getting long, he would need to cut it soon.
“Can we start with a group intervention first?” Chigiri rolled his eyes.
“We already did. 3 months ago and look at how well that went.”
__________________________________________
“Nagi, how old are you?”
Nagi’s lifeless eyes blinked back at him.
“23.”
Nagi’s birthday was a month ago. He was supposed to be 24. That was until Isagi came and took Nagi’s psyche with him.
The group was silent, the air still damp with the realization something was wrong.
He was still frozen in the month when Isagi was still alive.
Nagi turned his head towards Chigiri and Bachira. “I thought you would be coming with Yoichi. Where is he?”
“He’s de–” “He's coming soon,” Reo interjected.
The rest looked at him in varying degrees of disappointment. Reo ignored it and looked as Nagi’s eyes brightened.
“Good. I already miss him.”
══════════════════
Reo hung his head back as he slumped on his balcony. The evening air swept his hair and dried the morning sweat.
“How is he holding up?”
“Still searching for Isagi.” There was a low chuckle.
“Just like old times.” Reo bit his lips. There was a blotch of dark red blood on his chin.
“Yeah.”
__________________________________________
“He’s not eating.”
Chigiri blinked slowly while Kunigami continued mindlessly chewing a slightly burnt toast.
“Isn't that normal for him? He was never fond of eating.”
Until Isagi that is.
“No, he hasn't even for days!” Reo slammed his coffee cup down. The taste was bitter, his lips cracked and his body shook.
Chigiri and Kunigami shared a meaningful look.
“Were you expecting him to eat?” Chigiri said, looking at the coffee stain with a slight disdain.
“Well, I mean…yeah.”
“Reo, what Chigiri is trying to say is that Isagi died so it makes sense why he isn’t…” Eating? Drinking? Sleeping? Living? Functioning as a human being?
“Do you not care about him? He’s your friend too!”
Why couldn't they see that what Nagi was going on wasn’t normal at all? It’s not a part of the grieving process. He needs help fast! He can’t continue the way he is now.
The air crackled; Reo’s irritated scent swept and Chigiri’s own indignant countered it. The kitchen was a ramp with the putrid scent of angry and hurt alpha, even Kunigami’s soothing scent did nothing to dispel it. “Reo.”
To his surprise, it wasn't Chigiri’s stern voice but Kunigami’s.
“He is. Of course, we care about him too. But we’re all suffering, Isagi is our–was our friend too. Nagi lost someone important to him.” “But.”
“Let him grieve. You shouldn’t stop him from feeling it.”
“But, he’s dying. He needs our help. Isagi wouldn't want this.”
“Don’t bring in his name like that, Reo. We know how you felt about Nagi but don’t get Isagi involved like that.”
Getting flustered, Reo backed up, he swung his arms around: “That’s not what this is about. That has nothing to do with it. I mean I–” “That's the end of this conversation,” Chigiri interjected, his scent let out a foul stench the second he mentioned the omega and he side-stepped and left the kitchen with a worried Kunigami following him.
The coffee stain remained and smeared his sleeves too.
__________________________________________
“Let's go, Nagi.” There was a still eerie silence.
“Nagi?”
It lapsed into an uncomfortableness that Reo had gotten too comfortable with lately.
“No.” “Nagi.” His voice was stern, exasperated. He could be understanding, and supportive of his best friend and the man he fell for but this was getting annoying. Why can’t Nagi wake up and realize that the other side of the bed will forever be cold and empty?
Reo slumped his shoulders and relaxed his jaw. If he put it like that, he comes across as a huge asshole. He can be patient with and for Nagi, that's the least he can do for Isagi.
“Nagi. He’s not coming back.” “He’s coming home soon. Yoichi would never let me alone for this long.”
So Nagi was still in the first stage it seemed. Denial.
“Nagi, come on.” He tried, voice sweeter, softer (to sound perhaps hopefully like the raven-haired lover).
But Nagi continued on, staring at the door, still donned in black.
══════════════════
Late February
“Hey, Nagi?” “Yes?”
At his beck and call, Nagi came. The slightest tips of sunlight glittered gently on Yoichi’s face. The slight chill of the late winter gust of air left a thrilling chill on his arms. They were drinking roasted green tea that his parents sent them from their travels. The aroma of hot tea and Yoichi’s fruity scent made Nagi feel warm and cozy.
“I always wanted to know what drew you to me?” Nagi blinked. He pulled the tiny omega onto his broad chest and kissed the top of his head. He truly was so tiny, he liked to bring him on top of his chest and he still couldn't fit.
“You’re light.” “Light? Are you making fun of my size again, Nagi?” Nagi’s nose crinkled at the use of his last name. He placed his hands on top of Yoichi’s thin waist, rubbing small circles on them to relax his easily irritable lover.
“No. not like that. Like actual light that goes at 2,9979,2458 m/s.”
Yoichi stared at him incredulously. Oh yeah, he still didn’t believe that he ranked at the top of his elite high school.
Nagi brought their bodies closer together. He peered at Yoichi’s soft blue eyes and sunk into them.
“Yeah like I was saying. You seem to think you're insignificant, but that’s so far from the actual truth. You're so intelligent, beautiful, kind, and lovely.”
Nagi shuffled closer, he pulled the both of them up and they both sat on the windowsill together. The winter sun-soaked Yoichi in an ethereal glow. Yup, he truly is the light of his life.
“I don't think I’m the first person to have fallen in love with you,” he grumbled softly to himself. But stared at Isagi’s soft face and big blue eyes.
“And I won't be the last.”
Nagi could already have the number of people that loved Isagi on his hands but then he wouldn't have enough hands to count them all. But enough about them. He never liked talking about other men with Yoichi.
“But I do know that I will love you the most.”
__________________________________________
Nagi never knew what he wanted to be. That is until he joined a strange football death game project and met someone like Light. So whenever someone was to ask what he wants to be in the future, he wouldn't say a famous football player or any monumental goal like winning the Ballon d’Or. Instead with a puffed-up chest, he would say with all of his heart:
“I want to be someone Isagi likes.”
__________________________________________
Reo heard some scuffling from the living room. Was Nagi still scouring for Isagi’s things again? He took off his shoes and marched forward.
Nagi was on the ground, crouching down and glaring at an old photo book. All around him were old pictures of Isagi: him in his high school soccer, him in his high school ceremony picture, his coming of age day picture.
Yet Nagi seemed to be strongly fixated on the high school photobook. His hands were clutching and it seemed as though he was strangling the poor book.
“Hey, Reo.” “Hmm?”
“Does this boy look like me?” Reo shuffled closer and squinted at the class photo Nagi was holding up. It was Isagi’s high school photo, the boy donned a dark blue uniform and was huddled a fair distance from the rest of his classmates. Not too close or too far, the average distance one would hold with classmates you're friendly enough too. His eyes strayed from Isagi’s forever baby face and blue eyes and turned towards the boy Nagi was pointing almost angrily at.
“I wonder.” Reo’s gaze shifted to Nagi.
The boy in the photo had the same pretty snow-white hair that Isagi loved, the same toss away hair, and pale skin. Similar facial features and had the same bored expression on their faces. They had white hair, pale skin, and the same nose but that was where the similarities stopped.
“Would it matter though?” Reo asked.
“Huh?”
“Would it matter if this boy looked like you?”
Nagi gulped.
“He does, doesnt he?”
“What do you mean?”
“He said I was his first,” Nagi said.
His fingers pointed accusingly at one white-haired boy.
“Nagi…” Even now, as the months faded, Nagi continued to miss Isagi even getting jealous of Isagi’s long past.
“I don't want to forgive him, but I probably will.” “Nagi, are you trying to compete with a high school boy?”
Realization dawned on the snowy man.
“Yeah. It's weird, isn't it?” Nagi said, still cradling the photobook and brushing off a few strands of tears.
“It is.” What a lucky man, Isagi was. Making Nagi jealous after he’s gone.
══════════════════
Early April
It was a slow, sticky summer. Kissing Yoichi always left Nagi with a sort of tingling sensation in his mouth and he wonders how he could have gone his whole life without it. They were semi-dreaming on their shared bed, they celebrated Yoichi’s birthday a week ago and the day was still on his mind.
Yoichi wearing a beautiful dark blue dress, and their mutual friends jokingly ask when he is going to put a ring on him. Nagi brushed their snide comments away, in all due time. He has the rest of his life with Yoichi anyway besides he dates to marry and they already live together and they are pretty much already married ready.
But the thought of having Yoichi called Yoichi Nagi made his stomach flip and his ears blush.
But here, right now the air was perfect, it was cloudy and birds were crying their love for the omega. Here, Nagi Seishirou was, cradling Yoichi between his arms and it all felt like a white dream.
“Yoichi.” “Hmm?”
“I’m lucky to meet you.”
Yoichi slowly woke up from the soft cradles of sleep, his limbs were slow and his eyes were full of crust but still shone brightly. The day was summery as airy and bright as he was.
It felt as though he spent all of his life’s luck to meet Yoichi. Nagi was truly favored to have met him; he must have saved Japan in his past life, Nagi wondered.
“Meeting you was the reward of my life,” Nagi said and wrapped the omega closer to his chest.
__________________________________________
Nagi was on his bed now. Only he was on the left side, cuddling Isagi’s pillow with a Polaroid picture taken of his lover (his face surprised at the camera, unsuspecting but still carrying the light and fresh flush).
“He gave me lots of good memories. But I want more from him.” Nagi said clutching Isagi’s pillow.
“I pester him after his death and beg for more.”
“I'm such a selfish guy.”
══════════════════
Mid-May
“Yoichi. I've always been waiting for you.” Isagi tilted his head. They were walking back from meeting Nagi’s parents for the first time. The meeting went better than expected and the two were quickly enamoured with the dulcet omega. They were already asking them about marriage and asking when they will process the papers and that Christmas is right around the corner and it's a lucky date to get married and all.
Nagi enjoyed his parents fretting. He was glad that they had immediately taken to Isagi like he had. Perhaps it's a genetic thing, it runs in his veins to love Isagi.
“Huh? What do you mean?” Isagi asked, confused, missing what Nagi could only understand.
“Once for when I was waiting to meet you and the second time for when I was waiting to see you again.”
Nagi walked behind him, chasing him, and stopped.
The greenery suited Isagi’s face and he wanted to stare at him a bit longer.
“So I guess I'll always be waiting for you to change my life .”
__________________________________________
Nagi realizes it one summery day.
Nobody told him. Reo made sure of that, so Reo truly didn't know how he figured it out. But maybe in some deeper inner workings of his mind he always knew but was too lazy or in denial to realize.
“Reo?”
“Yes, Nagi?”
“Why hasn't he come back yet?”
Reo blinked.
“What do you mean?”
“Isagi. Yoichi. My Yoichi, why hasn't he come back to haunt me?” Nagi muttered slowly. “I don't want to be alone like this.”
Nagi said, sliding his hand from his neck to rubbing his necklace. His finger twirled the golden band. The cold metal touched his skin and he imagined it was his lips. “It’s like all the light in the world is snuffed out.”
Nagi snuggled himself closer to himself, wrapping his arms around his chest for some semblance of familiar comfort.
Reo stared hard. And gazed at the couple photo lined like tombstones around the bedroom.
__________________________________________
“Nagi please.”
“I don’t want to. Yoichi wouldn’t feed me this.”
Anger spread to his veins, in all his little capillaries and he was so close to losing it. Reo was starting to panic now. He even tried to threaten Nagi to eat his medicine but he won't listen.
He had to eat his medicine or else.
“I want some blueberries. Isagi really smells like it you know? Like the first batch in early summer and one time we went to a berry farm in his hometown and I ate so much I got sick but I could never get sick of Isagi’s blueberry scent.”
Reo slumped down on the kitchen chair. And here he goes again, chanting Isagi’s scent as if that was supposed to fix everything. It must be nice for Nagi to be so enamored with an omega’s scent. Only alphas can smell an omega’s distinctive scent after they mated.
But for an alpha like Reo…he could only imagine what Nagi’s true scent is.
“Blueberries huh?”
“Yeah with a tiny whiff of caramel and sea salt and–”
Wait that might work. Reo cracked his knuckles and tied his hair.
“I'll be right back but hold that thought.”
He came back with a tiny plastic container of ripe blueberries from the nearby farmer's market.
Much like a dog, he put Nagi’s pill inside a slightly bigger blueberry and gave it to him.
When Nagi looked questioningly up at him, Reo smiled: “It’s blueberries like Isagi’s scent.”
And obediently he ate it and licked his lips.
Thank God. His stupid idea actually worked. All Nagi asks for is Isagi, he couldn't believe that just by shoving medicine in a blue fruit would Nagi actually listen and eat his treatment.
“Can I have the rest of that?” “Sure,” Reo said, shoving the rest of the blueberries at him. He would have to repeat this three times a day for Nagi’s daily medicine. Maybe he should try adding blueberry-favored food, maybe that way Nagi could finally eat. Reo’s eyes slowly glanced at Yoichi’s photo on the table. The picture that he carries around everywhere.
“But also could you continue, what does Isagi smell like again?”
The light returned to Nagi’s eyes and he continued on. As Nagi was prattling on the delicacy and the intricacy of his scent Reo started listing down the ingredients and sent it.
Perhaps this will be it.
══════════════════
It wasn't it.
He only meant to spray a little.
He first sprayed on Isagi’s side of the sofa. On the comically small sofa pillow that Isagi always hugged and cuddled when his friends came over to watch one of their matches. Nagi never allowed the others to touch it.
It would taint Isagi’s scent, Nagi said when Kurona tried to hold it.
Reo thought that Nagi wouldn't even notice it. His nose always seemed blocked, he never paid attention to people’s scents whether for platonic or romantic reasons. Not even to gauge their reactions or read the room or anything. But that all stopped when Isagi came and unblocked all of his senses.
Because of Isagi, it seemed as though all of his senses alighted and he could immediately tell that Isagi was happy with a kintsubi omiyage or upset that Nagi didn't clean the dishes with the tiniest whiff in his direction.
But Reo wasn't expecting it to go this well.
Nagi almost like clockwork sprang to life as soon as the scent entered his nose.
He doesn't talk or even acknowledge Reo’s presence as he got up and walked to Isagi’s soft pillow.
He sniffed and held it like a lifeline.
And as if possessed he started to walk around the apartment as if he was entering it for the first time. It was calm at first, merely sniffing each piece of furniture and opening each closet and cabinet. This went on for hours. Reo tried to call him to eat lunch and then supper and then dinner.
But Nagi ignored his calls and continued searching, investigating each room and crevice for his blueberry scent. He was docile about it. That is until he got frustrated. He upturned the entire apartment; he started knocking everything, the closet, the bed all for the chance to see him again.
Nagi spent the entire day looking for Isagi’s (scent).
Reo tightens the lid on the perfume.
He needs to lessen the potency.
Reo’s eyes lightened up.
He can do this. It worked too well, with just a few adjustments he can fix everything. Nagi will be back to how he is.
He can make Nagi live.
__________________________________________
“Oh, the place is a bit clean.”
“Yeah, Nagi finally didn’t kick the cleaners out this time.”
Chigiri turned to him, “Oh how? He went near ballistic when we came over after the funeral proceedings.”
“Oh well, you know some time and some,” Reo said, eyes bouncing from one corner to another.
“Isagi?”
Chigiri’s scent softened and Bachira pouted.
“That’s Isagi’s scent.”
Oh, no. He knew that Nagi could sniff Isagi out in a room of hundreds of omegas but he forgot that these two were also inextricably linked together. Like Nagi, just one sniff of their dear friend’s scent and they know.
“How?”
The two didn’t question any longer and rushed into the apartment, slamming the door open and Chigiri was already ahead with Bachira hysterically searching for the dark blue-haired omega.
Of course, like Nagi, they couldn't find him either.
They both turned to him, slowly, each slow step calculated as if they were about to strike.
“What did you do?”
“I can explain.” “I don’t care to hear it,” Chigiri growled, grabbing him by the collar and bruising his windpipe.
“Wait Chigiri, I really can explain.” “I don’t want to hear it.”
And like that, there was a hard punch to his nose. Which wasn’t much of a loss, he couldn't really smell well anyway.
“This one is for Isagi,” Bachira said and added a rough shove to the wall.
Even with Isagi gone. They still think highly of him more than me, Reo ponders crouching and cradling his stomach.
There was some rumbling behind the door. Nagi appeared like a breath of fresh air but his eyes were gazed and there was a heaviness in his steps.
“If you’re going to fight can you fight outside? Yoichi doesnt like fights inside the house. He says that it takes ages to clear angry alpha stench.”
Even Nagi too. And swiftly as he came, he left for the imaginary Isagi waiting for him.
“I don’t want to hear it, Mikage. Whatever you're doing…you might think you’re some hero for doing it. But listen to me when I say that what you’re doing is so evil and disgusting.”
“You might think you’re helping Nagi but you’re not. You’re making things worse.” “But Isagi would have–”
“Isagi would have never wanted this. He wants Nagi to move on, and be happy but this isn’t happiness. You’re just torturing him and us and you.”
“Reo you’re hurting yourself by doing this.” “What are you hoping to achieve when you do this, huh?”
Reo was at a loss for words. What was he doing this for anymore?
“I don’t know.”
Chigiri sighed.
“Just stop doing this. Please.”
Reo closed his eyes and tried to pretend that he had the power to stop.
__________________________________________
“Nagi, do you trust me?”
“Huh?”
“Yes or no?”
Nagi was silent. Reo ignored the fracture his heart.
“Yes…” “Okay, Im going to blindfold you but trust me I'm not going to hurt you.”
Nagi nodded, his body as stiff as a stone.
Reo unscrewed the lid and carefully applied it to his wrists.
At the first spray, Nagi immediately perked up.
“Yoichi?”
Reo pushed the porridge to his lips. With a slight hesitation, he opened his mouth and started to chew it.
Reo smiled in satisfaction. This was working. Nagi is eating, he will pull through.
This continued for some time until he could eat at least one meal a day. He tried for two but Nagi’s crying turned to hiccups and he almost choked. There were too many accidents so he settled with one meal a day for now.
And when Nagi started to close his mouth and turn his head around, all Reo would need to do was to rub his wrists together and push them towards his sensitive nostrils.
And like bio-chemical magic, Nagi’s defenses were lowered and he was tame like a puppy. He would dutifully follow his orders and eat and drink.
Reo pulled back the bowl. Nagi was silent again.
Did the porridge go cold?
He took a tiny taste. It was still warm. A bit salty though, Reo was sure he only added eggs and very little spices, he turned to Nagi’s face.
Oh, he was crying.
__________________________________________
“Nagi you have to sleep.”
Although Nagi was eating (just barely but he kept turning his head sideways, looking around for Isagi’s praises each bite he took). Reo almost considered using AI to reconstruct Isagi’s voice to command Nagi to live again.
But at that suggestion, Bachira punched him straight in the nose.
There was enough of that. The voice reconstruction was out of the window when Reo had to ice his broken nose.
So instead he has come to this.
He had to carefully maneuver around Nagi’s and Isagi’s shared room for this to work. This was the one room where Nagi was the most territorial and violent over. It took him months just for Nagi to let him see through the door cracks. Luckily, with the perfume he had on hand, Nagi was more forgiving to let him through.
He had a fleeting thought to spray the perfume on his person but that felt immoral to both himself, Nagi, and to the deceased Isagi.
But at the thought of having Nagi look, and gaze at him the way he did to Isagi ever since the second selection in Bluelock got his heart stopping and his lips loose. He could. What is so wrong with having someone you want to look at you the way you always wanted to be looked at?
The profane thought squeezed his heart and insides. His eyes stopped at a picture of Nagi and Isagi during their romantic getaway to Enoshima Island he looked away. It felt as if gazing at the photo any longer would burn and sear his fingers.
So he buried that thought inside like his feelings and carried on.
He reached the left side of the bed and touched Isagi’s pillow.
His scent was slowly fading despite Nagi’s persistent attempts. No wonder why he couldn't sleep anymore, each night his scent was continuing to fade and Nagi’s own lemony laundry scent was replacing it. His blueberry scent was quickly fading but luckily for both of them, he could revive Isagi.
“Now you can sleep well, Nagi.”
He sprayed four times on the pillow. And for good measure, he added some beans inside and heated up the pillow at an omega temperature too. Now he can cuddle the pillow and pretend it's Isagi. Before he left, he rubbed the pillow between his hands and apologized.
“I’m sorry, Isagi.”
Reo leaves the bedroom quickly after the confession. He doesn’t know why he left so quickly. Maybe he doesn’t want to know; maybe he’s scared Isagi’s ghost might come and haunt him instead.
But maybe it’s because Nagi always gets rowdy when anyone disturbs his and Isagi’s alone time.
The next day, he finds that Nagi is still sleeping once he arrived in the still afternoon, his arms deathly tight around Isagi’s pillow.
Reo smiled, unbeknownst to himself.
His plan was working beautifully.
__________________________________________
It has been a couple of days now. The perfume was perfect, it could fool his lover Nagi and even his closest of friends. Nagi wears his blindfolds every day now. He can manage his way around the house, easily maneuvering around. Rather than slumping and slouching every time he had to get up and go to the bathroom, there seemed to be the slightest skip to his step. He seemed livelier, he seemed happier to be alive.
Everything was fine and peaceful, Nagi wanted to live. He ate his food, he slept soundly and he was eating his medicine hourly. Everything was fine. Nagi was reverting back to how he usually was before Isagi.
And Reo could fool himself into thinking this was right. That he was doing a good thing, saving his friend, and that his friend’s lover would be happy and even proud of him for doing this.
The house was clean, and Isagi smelled as if he was still alive and well. Well, that was how Nagi lived and continued to live.
That was until:
“Isagi?”
Reo didn't pay it any mind at first. This was Nagi he was usually muttering his beloved name every second and while he was sleeping. Isagi was a word in his daily vocabulary but what wasn't in his vocabulary was:
“Where’s my morning hug?”
“Huh?”
Nagi comes over and hugs him.
But it feels wrong. He wasn't hugging him. Not in the manner he used to side-hug him the way alphas do.
He was hugging him like an omega. His broader body was shrouding him, entirely encasing him in his scent and towering over him to calm him into a pliant submissiveness like a distraught omega.
Or in other words, he was hugging him as if he were hugging Isagi.
“Nagi, I’m not.” An omega, your lover, the one you love, the one you’re eyes always search for when you first walk into a room.
I’m not Isagi.
“You've got taller. You used to fit into my arms so well,”
There was the slightest scent of clean sheets and something within Reo cracked.
Reo closed his eyes. This wasn't so bad. It didn't matter how morally or ethically wrong this was. He didn't care how much of an asshole he is for letting this happen. He tried to stop him. Say that he is an alpha and that he is Nagi’s best friend.
So he leaned into the strange embrace not suitable, not appropriate for alpha for him.
Isagi would melt into Nagi’s hug, he can always see how from a distance how perfectly he fits in Nagi’s large body. The perfect height difference for Nagi to slot his head on the top of Isagi’s black hair and for Isagi to kiss his mating bite.
But here no matter how weird or awkward their placement is, Reo can try and make it fit.
Reo doesn't mind if he can be isagi. If he can mold his entire being to be Isagi for Nagi. Then he would do it.
He can be Isagi for him.
Reo reached for Nagi’s large hands, hope bloomed and he opened his eyes. There was nothing and the touch was stone cold.
“Yoichi, are you feeling okay? You don’t smell like yourself. You smell…off. Different.” Like a putrid alpha?
“Yoichi your hair got lighter, was it from the shampoo?”
“Nagi.” “It's Seishiro, only the others call me Nagi. But we’re married so we call each other by our first name, Yoichi. Don't tell me you forgot?”
They haven’t even married yet.
“Nagi no it's Reo. Mikage Reo. Your best friend.”
Nagi slowly blinked.
“Who?” And just like that the illusion was broken. Oh, he gets it now. Why Nagi was comfortable with holding him, embracing himself. His entire existence was wiped out like that.
To Nagi, there was no Reo.
There was no Mikage Reo to Nagi anymore just the empty ugly plastic mold of Isagi Yoichi.
He never existed. He is gone, all their memories and everything gone. All just so that he can mimic and pretend to be someone he wasn’t but that wasn’t enough. Instead, his entire existence was cruelly replaced.
“Your best friend.” Nagi placed a burning hand on his forehead.
“Are you okay, Yoichi? You’ve been talking some nonsense. Is your pre-heat coming?” No, he's no omega. He's an alpha (no matter how many times he wishes he could change it). No matter how many nights he wished he was born someone else or at least an omega, perhaps that way he could have stood a chance but deep down he knew that he never had a chance from the start.
“No, Nagi I’m so sorry.” What has he done?
“Don't cry, Yoichi.” Im, not him. I can never be him.
But isn’t this okay? To indulge in something he can never have? To have Nagi hold him like he always dreamed of. This is what he wanted right?
“Yoichi, you've gotten bigger, were we successful this time?”
Reo pushed him. Hard. He did not want to think about this. The last comment boiled his insides: were they trying before Isagi…
Reo bottled that thought and threw it away into the recess of his mind. He can't bear to look at Isagi or even think about the petite omega, especially not now with his alpha looking worried over him.
“I’m not Yoichi. Im Reo.” “Huh?”
“Isagi is dead. Has been, ever since the beginning.”
“What?”
“Look at me.” And Nagi looked at him. But it wasn't the warm gaze he always gave to Isagi, it thawed and cracked.
“No.”
“Yeah, I don't have black hair, and I'm not an omega, and I’m, not the person you love.”
“Is he actually dead?”
Of course, he asks about him. Who else occupies his mind but him?
“Yes.” “How, when where?”
Nagi was panicking now.
“Car accident, November, Shinjuku for the friendly games with–”
“Was I not there?”
“Huh?” “I couldn't protect him?”
Reo shook his head, too tired and weary to talk anymore.
“I should have died with him.”
“No, Nagi don't say that.”
Nagi didn't say anything more but left the room and the house and his life.
Reo finds out later from the others that Nagi soon died after that. He couldn't take the fact that Yoichi was no longer in the world with him. Reo already knew that it would come to this. This was going to happen since the beginning and always has been.
Where Isagi goes,
he follows.