500 words or so short fic
Teru thinks there should usually be more people at a funeral. But he isn’t sure: this is his first time, and it happens to be his mother’s photo among the candles, and he has no other relatives, no other friends. He is not infallible; he could always be wrong.
So he shifts awkwardly in the scuffed pair of black shoes he wears to school, uncertain of what to do. If anyone asks, it’s because he came straight from class, which isn’t a lie – Teru doesn’t lie – but really, it’s because it’s his only decent pair. Whichever relative he gets passed onto might care enough to buy him some new ones. He can only hope.
His current plan is the following. To get into university, to graduate, to find a stable job and support himself. To stay alive. He looks at his mother again. It’s harder than it sounds.
But isn’t this justice? Isn’t this right? Everyone who had ever contradicted him, suddenly six feet under in a freak accident. If he loved his mother any less, he would say she had it coming. But as it stands, he can barely think of her without crying. This is justice, he consoles himself. This is what he should be living for.
“You look like your mother,” Misa says. She scrutinises the photo and Teru’s frowning face in turn. “She’s so beautiful.”
Sharing photos of one’s dead parents was hardly a conventional way to spend time with a friend, but it certainly was one, and Misa was anything but conventional. She passes the photo back to him across the table. “I look more like my father,” she continues. “A bit shorter.”
Teru nods in agreement. “Funny - all my relatives used to say I resemble more of my father too. Though I suppose they never bothered to look at me closely enough to make a proper judgement.”
Misa snickers into her sleeve. Teru smiles despite himself.
“Yeah, my relatives hated me too. Loud, not a male, a college dropout, you get the gist. But my parents loved me, no matter what.” Misa seems to quiver for a second. “I wish I’d known that earlier.”
Teru doesn’t want to admit it. But Misa is now fighting back tears, and her eyes are demanding the truth, and the truth is all he will ever give. “Same here.”
They both stay silent for a long, aching moment.
“Oh, God,” Misa laughs out at last, a choking sob. “I can’t believe I’m crying.”
“Oh, but look on the bright side,” says Teru. “You’re young and happy, somewhere those relatives will never bother you again, and I’m sure that we can throw a nice little party when they finally die.”
Misa descends into cackles. “Those idiots genuinely wanted me dead.”
“And look at us now. Still alive, Misa. Justice always prevails.”
“Yes,” she says. “Yes, that’s how I like to think about it, at the end of the day.”
“That’s the right way to think about it,” he replies. As if there was ever any doubt in the first place.
romaincrisis
snowghoul
2087
