no white flags

It doesn’t surprise you that you aren’t the only person whose life Kai ruined. When you’re honest with yourself, you can admit that Kai had to have been letting it out somewhere else, all those times he wasn’t beating you. But you’re still shocked at the scale of what Kai’s done. The sheer number of people who’ve been tormented because of him. You know Kai as an abuser. The other people he hurt know him as a mad scientist, a monster of a different breed. The ones who survived, at least. Kai has killed people. You’re still kind of shocked you aren’t one of them.

Leaving Kai felt impossible, but he’s in jail awaiting trial and you’re free, and you’re working on wiping out every piece of your life he controlled. Today at the doctor’s, that means updating your address, changing your insurance (again), and clearing off your emergency contact. The receptionist asks if you want to add somebody else. You add Emi, because she said it was okay. And after a moment’s hesitation, you add Tomura, too.

They’ve become the anchor points of life without Kai, as strange as that is to admit. You could live a hundred lifetimes and still not deserve Emi — she let you crash on her couch for almost a month, and when her lease came up and her roommate moved out, she let you move in officially. She’s had your back with everything, from little things like making sure you got your old cubicle back at work to big things like going with you and Mr. Yamada to file for your divorce from Kai. You’ve tried to pay her back as best you can. You’re back to paying rent and utilities, holding up your end of the bargain and trying to remember how to be a good roommate, how to be an actual person instead of a shell of yourself. The person you are outside of Kai’s shadow is someone you haven’t seen in a while, somebody Emi’s never met. The first time you cautiously cracked a dirty joke in front of her, she stared at you with her jaw dropped for a solid fifteen seconds before she burst out laughing.

“Finally,” she said, grinning. “Now that I know that conservative shtick was all him, I’ve got so many jokes for you.”

Emi’s taken the slow reappearance of your old self mostly in stride, but Tomura, who only knew your old self, meets any sign that you’re still you with relief. The fact that he knew you before makes the damage — inflicted first by his stalking, then amplified a thousand times over by Kai — all the more apparent. Tomura hasn’t run away from the stalking. He hasn’t pretended it didn’t happen or downplayed it or brought up the fact that everything Kai did was so much worse. It just sat there between you, until the day you finally asked him why.

Not good reasons, he said, and then it was quiet for a little while. It made sense in my head. I knew you still loved me. You even said it while we were breaking up, and I don’t think you were lying.

I wasn’t lying, you said. That wasn’t why we were breaking up.

Yeah. And if I was breaking up with somebody I still loved, it would be because I wanted them to prove they loved me, Tomura said. Try to make them leave. If they really loved me, they wouldn’t let me go.

Something about that broke your heart. It made sense to me, Tomura continued, so I figured it was what you were doing, too. Except you were a normal person, and I was raised by a psychopath. What made sense to me would sound crazy to you.

Back then, yes. Now? A little less crazy than before. How did you come around? you asked, and Tomura hesitated. Did you come around?

Right around when you started dating him, because of him, Tomura said, and your stomach dropped. When he talked to me, he said pretty much exactly what I just said to you. The bastard did research on me. The court cases against Sensei and everything. He said that I’d traumatized you and you had trust issues and paranoia because of me, and —

And if you really loved me, you should leave me alone. You can imagine Kai’s voice saying just those words. And you listened.

Yeah. What was I supposed to do? He was right. Tomura looked down at his hands in his lap. I stepped back. Because of what he said, and because thinking about you with other people made me sick. I couldn’t stand to watch that closely anymore.

That’s why he talked to you, you said, and Tomura looked at you. He couldn’t do all the things he wanted to if someone was watching.

But he was still right about me, Tomura said. I never wanted to scare you. I’m not going to do that again. If you say you want me gone, I know you mean it.

I know, you said, and you bit down on the next thing before you could say it: I’m not going to say that again.

You and Tomura aren’t together, not in public or in private, but the two of you talk every day. He always lets you initiate, never asks where you are or what you’re doing or why you haven’t messaged him back yet. You’ve got space from him if you want it, all the space you didn’t have after the breakup. In spite of the fact that he saved your life, you don’t feel a ton of pressure. Maybe that’s why you keep talking to him so much.

You and Tomura were friends first. Best friends, almost. You missed your best friend more than you wanted to admit, and as you work on finding yourself again, it’s a relief to have him by your side. But you’d be lying if you said there wasn’t some kind of spark, some kind of chemistry between the two of you. Tomura doesn’t mention it, doesn’t push your boundaries. Which is a good thing, because right now, with him, you don’t have a clue where your boundaries are.

Once your doctor’s finished checking over your injuries, she asks you about birth control. She’s willing to give you the pill without a physical examination, but that’s not what you’re after. “I want the IUD.”

The doctor blinks. “Are you sexually active?”

“Not right now,” you say, “but I don’t want to take chances. I just want to get it taken care of and stop worrying about it. And I don’t want anyone to be able to mess with it.”

You’re pretty sure Kai started the whole trying-for-a-baby thing by tampering with your pills, trying to get you pregnant by accident rather than force a conversation and potential pushback from you. It’s not because of Tomura. It’s not because you’re thinking about him. You’re just being careful. The doctor nods. “I’ll put in a referral to OB-GYN. They should call you to set up an appointment sometime later today.”

You nod. The doctor tilts her head, studying you. “Are you still seeing your therapist?”

“Every week.”

“And have you given any more thought to medication? I can set up a referral for a psychiatrist as well.”

You shake your head. “I already have the thing for nightmares. I shouldn’t take anything else until the trial’s over.”

You’ll be called as a witness during Kai’s trial. Unfortunately, it was Kai’s legal team who put you on the list. The prosecution isn’t touching the domestic violence and attempted murder against you in this trial; that will be the next one. But you know damn well why Kai’s lawyers calling you, and it’s a big problem. You had no idea what Kai was doing at work. You spent more time with him than anybody. If you didn’t see anything, none of it happened.

Mr. Yamada’s instructed you to reference the domestic violence whenever possible, both to remind the court of Kai’s potential for violence and to explain why you were too scared to ask questions. When you think about bringing it up in court, you feel like you’re going to be sick. Some anti-anxiety medication would probably help. But you’re going to need all your wits about you to avoid torpedoing the prosecution’s case, and if that means fighting through on your own, so be it.

The OBGYN calls you on your lunch break at work, and you make an appointment for a week from now to get an IUD placed. You’ll feel better once that’s done. Once you know there’s no chance you’ll have a baby you don’t want.

Work goes easily, and you and Emi head home together, as has become usual. “Me and Shouta are going out tonight,” she says. “It’s our three-month anniversary. I probably won’t be back until late.”

“Dinner and a movie?”

“A late movie. He says there’s something he wants to talk about,” Emi says. She frowns. “I hope he’s not breaking up with me.”

“If he was breaking up with you, I don’t think he’d have suggested the movie.”

“You’re probably right. You were right about him. He’s a good guy.” Emi’s frown melts away into a smile, and her eyes are soft when she glances your way. “I want that for you, too.”

“You don’t think Tomura’s a good guy?”

You’re faking surprise, and Emi laughs. She sobers up fast. “If I thought he was scary or creepy, I wouldn’t let him in the apartment. I know he’s been really respectful — this time. I just know you have a lot of history with him, and it’s not good. Even if he didn’t hurt you, he made things harder for you. And you’ve got enough going on right now already.”

You nod. Your therapist has said the same thing. Yamada’s said the same thing. Everybody says it’s a bad idea to start up a new relationship when you haven’t healed from the old one. You agree in theory. Mostly in practice, except the part where you’re not sure if you’ll ever heal from what happened with Kai. And even if you could, how are you supposed to explain it to somebody else? You were weird even before Kai showed his true colors, and now you’re even worse. You startle easily. You apologize too much. You panic if someone calls you unexpectedly or knocks on the door with an Amazon package or even sends you a text that could be read two ways. Nobody who doesn’t know why you ended up like that is going to put up with it. And there’s only one person in the world who you know understands.

“That just went in one ear and out the other, didn’t it?” Emi sighs. “Have him over tonight if you want to. Just take it to the bedroom if you get busy. My last roommate used to hook up on the couch all the time, and I saw way more random guys’ asses than I ever wanted to see.”

You laugh in spite of yourself. “Don’t worry. We’re just friends.”

You text Tomura while Emi’s getting ready for her date, and he comes over about half an hour after she’s left. He usually brings something for you, not that you’d ever ask him for anything, and today he’s brought you a claw clip like the one he gave you when you were in the hospital for your miscarriage. “I need my shitty one back,” he says. “You’re getting an upgrade.”

You are. This one’s metal, not plastic, and you can tell when you pinch it open that it has a stronger grip. “You know I don’t usually wear them in my hair, right?”

Tomura looks puzzled. “What do you do with it?”

You show him. The plastic one leaves dents in your skin; the metal one leaves bruises. “Like a bracelet,” Tomura says. “I can get you a bracelet that’s not going to do that.”

You shake your head. “I don’t need jewelry.”

“You barely have any. Toga says it all wound up in the evidence locker.”

“Not quite all of it,” you say. “They let me keep everything I could prove he didn’t buy.”

You barely complained about everything you owned being taken as evidence, but when you realized they had your whole jewelry box, some part of you rebelled. You didn’t care about the things Kai bought you, but the rest belonged to you, and you wanted them back. Mr. Yamada worked out a deal that let you sneak things out of evidence if you provided photo evidence of yourself wearing them before you met Kai. “I got the necklace back. The one you gave me.”

“I can’t believe you kept it.” Tomura’s sitting cross-legged on the couch, just like he used to do in high school. “You must have hated me. Why didn’t you throw it out?”

“I didn’t hate you,” you say. “It was — complicated.”

After you broke up with Tomura, you found yourself missing Tomura more than you thought you would. By the time he’d first started stalking you, you were wondering if you’d made a mistake, and although the stalking kept you constantly on edge, you never hated or feared Tomura the way you fear Kai. Based on his expression, Tomura knows you’re holding something back, but he doesn’t try to pull it out of you. “I’m glad you kept it,” he says. “I can afford the real stuff now. Tell me something you want and I’ll buy it for you.”

“No.”

“How come?”

You don’t know. You’re dead certain. “Just — no.”

Tomura’s got a stubborn look on his face. “I’m supposed to get you stuff.”

“We had this talk in high school,” you say. “My answer hasn’t changed.”

“Yeah, but everything else has,” Tomura says. “What’s the real reason? Is it because he bought all that expensive shit you didn’t want and made you wear it to show off? I swear I’ll only buy you the cheap stuff.”

“No.” Your voice is sharper than you meant to be. Louder, too. Tomura looks startled. “Drop it.”

It’s quiet. “Yeah,” Tomura says after a second. “I earned that one. I’m sorry.”

You don’t answer. Your heart is racing, and you don’t know why. You’re reading a threat, and you don’t know why. Tomura isn’t Kai. If you’d pulled that move on Kai, he’d have backhanded you so hard that your ears would still be ringing in the morning. Tomura’s never hurt you.

But he could, a voice in your head reminds you. Any man you date could do the exact same thing.

Tomura reaches out to you slowly, and when his hand’s in reach, you take it. Tomura follows along until he’s beside you. “Do you want me to leave?”

You shake your head. “Did you bring over some really gross horror movie to watch?”

“Yeah,” Tomura says after a second. “I haven’t seen it before. We don’t have to watch it. We can watch a rom-com or something.”

“A romcom?” You repeat, incredulous. “I married a monster. I didn’t get my personality removed.”

“I guess you never liked those,” Tomura says slowly. “You never liked my movies either.”

“I’m expanding my horizons,” you say. “Let’s watch.”

You’re having a hard time with feelings lately, both with having them in the first place and knowing what feeling you’re supposed to have in a given situation. Horror movies make it easy, and the movie Tomura picked is straightforward space horror. Tomura gets grossed out a lot faster than you do — he has a thing about eyeballs, and the first really scary shot involves a pair of empty eye sockets. The thing that gets to you is the creeping, omnipresent dread; something is wrong, you don’t know what, and it’ll be a disaster when it happens. That feeling’s familiar. You lived with it for five years.

You hadn’t seen it coming, the first time Kai hit you, but you’d known something was wrong that day anyway. It was six months after the wedding, and you were buying the house, because Kai insisted it was a better investment than renting was. Between the two of you, you had just enough money for the down payment, which you deposited into a newly opened joint account well in advance of signing the papers. The money wasn’t the problem. The problem was that you were late.

Seven minutes late to signing the papers, because you’d been a little late getting out of work for lunch, and there’d been just a little traffic. You knew Kai hated lateness, but the realtor wasn’t angry, and neither was the notary witnessing the signing. You got there, you signed on the dotted line next to Kai, and you and Kai were the proud owners of a starter home. Everything was fine. You assumed it would be fine.

It happened when Kai offered to drive you back to work. You thanked him, because it was nice of him and you couldn’t have just taken the bus, and he didn’t let on that anything was wrong until you were already in the car. Is there anything else you’d like to say?

Um — He’d caught you off-guard. You used to wonder what would have happened if you’d just known right away, if you’d just reacted faster, if you’d just apologized the way he likes, but now you know better. Kai had been waiting for an opportunity to assert control. This was it. I was just a little late.

Time is money. Kai’s grip on the steering wheel was loose, relaxed. And arriving promptly is a sign of respect.

Nobody minded, you said. They weren’t upset —

Ah. I forgot you can read minds. Kai’s voice sharpened slightly, and you felt the first faint twinge of foreboding. Forget about them. It was disrespectful to me.

I wasn’t even ten minutes late, you said, and you rolled your eyes. I said I was sorry.

Kai backhanded you across the face, missing your nose but setting your cheek and jaw on fire. I don’t believe you.

“Hey,” Tomura says, and you snap back into the present. “Are you okay? Are you — here?”

“I’m here,” you say.

“You sure?” Tomura looks skeptical. “That guy just got blown out of the airlock and you didn’t even flinch.”

Maybe you weren’t as here as you thought you were. “I just zoned out a little bit. Everything’s fine.”

Tomura looks even more skeptical than before. “I used to zone out like that, too. I was never going anywhere good.” It’s quiet for a second. “Did I — was it me? Did I do something to send you back there?”

“No,” you say. “I’d tell you.”

That’s not quite true. He’d know if he tripped your memories of Kai, because you’d run. You think he might know that. “Okay,” he says after a second. “Want to keep watching?”

“Yes,” you say. You settle in at Tomura’s side, your head on his shoulder, and watch things go to hell onscreen.

After the movie, the two of you sit quietly together. You haven’t picked up your head off Tomura’s shoulder yet, and for no reason you can think of, you feel drained. You’ve been really tired lately — more than you should be — but this feels different. Something inside that’s sick of trying to walk this tightrope, trying to balance so many things. The prosecution in one hand, your mental health in the other. Your need for your injuries to heal versus the fact that you have to be able to use your hand, even if it hurts. Everybody’s well-intentioned advice about you and Tomura, every book you’ve ever read about dating after abuse, everything you went through at his hands and then at Kai’s — all of that against the fact that Tomura never makes you feel like you have to play a part. That he lets you be yourself. That you feel safe with him. As much as it’s possible for you to feel safe, anyway.

“I was thinking,” you start, and Tomura startles slightly. “Would you ever want to go the arcade again?”

“The old one back home?”

“Any arcade,” you say. “I was thinking about the first time we went out. That was fun.”

“Yeah, it was,” Tomura agrees. He readjusts his grip on your hand. “But if you want to go out and do something, we should do something you like. I’m up for anything if you go with me.”

He says it like it’s nothing. Like anybody would say the same thing. “Kai would have hated it,” you say. “Because it was dirty. Or loud. Or the air smelled funny or there’s too many people and too many kids running around —”

“Really?” Tomura sounds surprised. “That asshole was obsessed with making you have kids and he doesn’t even like them?”

“I think he thought he’d like his own better,” you say. “Or he thought he could make it so they wouldn’t act that way. I don’t know. But I think — he would have hated the arcade, but you and I had so much fun that day. I want to figure out what fun is again.”

“I’m down to replay that level,” Tomura says, and you laugh. “What?”

“You still talk like a gamer.”

“I still play games,” Tomura says. You know. Sometimes you get him talking about it on purpose so you won’t have to say anything, although he always figures it out faster than you want him to. “A lot of stuff has changed, but a lot about me is still the same. I’m not a different person just because I aged. And neither are you.”

“That’s not why I’m different,” you say.

“That’s what I mean,” Tomura says. “Bad things happening don’t make you stop being who you are. When Toga showed me that picture, I could still see you. Not what he turned you into. Just you.”

Tomura’s grip on your hand tightens slightly. “I see you. Just like you saw me.”

“I still see you,” you say. Talking about this feels awful. You’re too tired. “Are you going with me to the arcade or not?”

“I’m in,” Tomura says, and the smile that crosses your face is some mix of real and relieved. Right now you don’t need to know which is which.

You regard the cup the nurse just handed you with no small amount of confusion. “What’s this for?”

“Standard practice,” the nurse explains. “Before we place an IUD, we do a pregnancy test. It’s just a precaution.”

You would love to never take another pregnancy test in your life. But that’s the point of the IUD, right? If all that stands between you and semi-permanent birth control is the prospect of peeing in a cup, you can handle it. You’ve handled way worse. You head to the bathroom, wishing you’d doubled up on the anti-anxiety meds they gave you to keep you calm during the procedure. This is a small complication, but your hands are still shaking. You’re just relieved you managed to deliver it without a spill.

They take you to an exam room and tell you to change into the gown, which is fine. Cold, but fine. You wrap your arms around yourself to keep warm and focus on calming yourself for the procedure. You’ve read about this. It’s going to suck. You might pass out. But it’s going to be fine. Everything is going to be —

The door opens and your doctor comes in. You take a deep breath, only to get it knocked out of you when you see the look on her face, and she gives you the small mercy of not dragging it out. “Your pregnancy test is positive,” she says. “I’m sorry.”

You know why she’s sorry. You know everything you need to know already, and for the first time since you woke up in the hospital you feel that quick, bright snap as your mind disconnects from your body, from reality, from life. It doesn’t matter that Kai’s in jail, probably going to prison for the rest of his life. Even when he’s behind bars, you can’t get away from him. There’s only one way to be sure.

The beautiful thing about losing your mind again is that you can hide it this time. You’ve already decided what you’ll do, so all you have to do is get yourself out of the doctor’s office in one piece, without raising any alarms. You speak quietly, calmly. You ask the doctor a few questions — even one about abortion, even though you know what the answer will be. It feels like the right thing to do. Like the kind of thing someone who’s not planning to kill herself as soon as she possibly can would say.

As you sneak out of the exam room and make your way to the exit, you hear the doctor instructing the nurses to have someone watch you, and asking the receptionist to call your emergency contacts in the order listed. That’ll be Emi first, then Tomura, which works in your favor — Emi has a job where she can’t drop everything at a moment’s notice, and Tomura has the kind of job where they’ll reschedule things to suit him if he decides not to show up. They’ll call Emi first. You have a head start.

But what are you going to do with it? You know above all else that you need to act before you lose your nerve, and that you need to make sure it sticks. Last time wasn’t foolproof. This time has to be, and that means not just making it stick, but making yourself hard to find in the aftermath. And you know you’re a coward. You don’t want it to hurt.

It’s going to hurt, but then it’ll be over. It won’t last the way the pain of being trapped with Kai’s baby for the rest of your life will. You turn right instead of left on the main road and start walking towards the bridge.

It occurs to you to pick up a rock on the way, but your workbag is heavy enough if you don’t let go of it. With every step you take, you can feel the veneer of calm you projected cracking. It’s not like it was that last day at Hassaikai Corp, where you knew there was no way out and just wanted to get it over with. Now there are things clawing at you, trying to pull you back. A safe place to live without anyone who hurts you. A job of your own. A future that was starting to look just a little brighter. Freedom. Friends. Tomura.

None of those things will exist when you have Kai’s baby. You keep walking until you reach the center of the bridge.

The water seems like a long way down. It looks cold and fast and deep, and as you stare down into it, you try to summon up some emotion, something to counteract the weak struggles of hope. There’s nothing that can combat it — what if, what if, what if — and you don’t need anything. You know. Cars are zooming past on the bridge in both directions, but no one slows down, asks if you’re okay. Would you, if you saw someone peering over the edge at the center of a bridge? You’d like to think so. It doesn’t matter now. You climb up and over the railing.

You hear brakes squealing, followed by a chorus of horns, and when you look up, you see a Rolls-Royce Phantom mid-fishtail, blocking one lane of the road. Whoever’s driving it leans on the horn in response to the honking, and the passenger-side door opens. A man stumbles out, and a faint twinge of horror runs through you. It’s Tomura.

You’d know him anywhere, and it crosses your mind to jump before he reaches you. But he’d probably jump in after you, and the last thing you heard, he can’t swim. And maybe this is good. You can explain why, and once he understands, he’ll let you go.

“Wait,” Tomura says. Wait, not don’t. Maybe he will understand. “I got the call from the clinic. They said — we were on our way there and I saw —”

Just your luck to pick the bridge he’d be driving on to come get you. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It’s all that matters. You’re what matters. What do I have to do to get that through your head?”

You can’t drag this out. Tomura’s first reaction will tell you everything you need to know, and then you’ll have proof — and he’ll have the reason, and know it wasn’t him. “I’m pregnant.”

Tomura’s expression doesn’t change. “I can’t get an abortion,” you continue, waiting for something, anything, to cross Tomura’s face. “I can’t have a baby that’s half him. And you don’t want me if it means that, so let me go.”

Tomura opens his mouth and you cut him off. “Don’t lie.”

“When have I lied to you?” Tomura’s expression still hasn’t changed. You’re still waiting for the hurt, the disgust, the feelings he’s never known how to hide. “I don’t care about him. I care about you. If there’s something we can do to get you out of this, we’ll do it, and if there isn’t —”

“There isn’t!”

“It doesn’t change anything,” Tomura continues. “I don’t care that it’s half his. It’s yours. That’s what matters to me.”

You shake your head. “I don’t believe you. You never wanted kids. You wouldn’t stick around while I raise some other guy’s baby.”

“Really?” Half a smile crosses Tomura’s face. “I want him to suffer for what he did to you. I already took everything else away. How do you think he’ll feel about the kid he wanted so much being raised by me?”

Somehow that, of all things, is what makes a dent in the mess boiling inside your skull. You don’t trust Tomura’s paternal instinct as far as you can throw it, but you do trust that he loves you. And you trust that he hates Kai enough to do just about anything to stick it to him. “If we can find a way out, we will,” Tomura says. “If not, we’ll make him suffer. He’s still in your head, but I can see how you win this. You win this by being alive and being happy. And if we end up with a kid nine months from now, you win by raising it to be nothing like him.”

You can’t think of anything that would unhinge Kai more thoroughly than that — having his kid, and raising it wrong. You find yourself nodding, and Tomura holds out his hands for yours. “I’ll help you back over. Come on.”

Your workbag is a counterweight, pulling you off-balance, but someone else grabs it and frees up your other hand. You glance over and recognize one of Tomura’s newer friends. Twice. “Hi,” you say awkwardly. “I’m sorry about this.”

“No worries, Shigaraki’s former girlfriend!” Twice chirps. “Sure, you gave him a heart attack, but I’m cool as a cucumber!”

Tomura looked so steady from the far side of the railings. Now that you’re on the same side, you can feel his hands shaking, see how shallow his breathing is, and before you can say so much as a word, he yanks you forward into his arms, hanging on so tight you can barely breathe. “I don’t care about anything else,” he says in your ear, his voice wavering. “I don’t. As long as you’re here. Don’t leave me again. Please.”

You nod against his shoulder and wrap your arms around him, surprised at the sigh of relief that exits his mouth, at how quickly it seems to set him at ease. Someone honks their horn, and Twice hollers at them. “Shut up, baldy! Can’t you see they’re having a moment?”

“You can have a moment in the car, right?” That’s Spinner’s voice. How many of Tomura’s friends did he bring? “We’re supposed to bring her back to the clinic. That’s what the doctor said.”

“Yeah,” Tomura says. He loosens his grip on you ever so slightly, and you stumble. Kai would have picked you up. Tomura just steadies you. “Come on.”

You get the story from Twice on the short drive to the clinic; the doctor called Tomura during a board meeting, which Tomura promptly left, and Twice and Spinner either borrowed or stole the CEO’s car to race to the rescue in. They’re in the driver’s and passenger’s seats; you and Tomura are in the back, seatbelts on, him leaning against you with an arm around your waist. You’re texting Emi, then Yamada, wondering when you’ll start feeling normal about this, when one of Tomura’s hands moves.

There are places he doesn’t touch you. He never puts a hand on your back, because Kai always did that, steering you through a room, always one move away from yanking you off-course. His hands never come close to your neck, even if it means giving you hugs that are more awkward than comforting. But the place he’s touching now, Kai never touched like this. You never gave him the chance. Tomura’s hand settles against your lower abdomen, fingers splayed, in a gesture that’s probably supposed to be reassuring. And that’s when it hits you for real — no false calmness, no determination to die and get this over with, not even the relief of knowing that Tomura’s still with you. For the first time since you woke up in the hospital, you burst into tears, and nobody, not Tomura or the doctor or anybody else, can make them stop.

<- Chapter 8