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“Oh..! Iwanako, I keep forgetting to tell you that..”

“Hmm?”

“I.. me and Lionel... we'll be leaving soon. To go.. travelling. Next month. This will be our last time seeing each other.....”

Smiling for her, I hold her hand warmly to let her know how I feel...

“Have a good time, Kaori....., I'll miss you.”

Wanting to say something, but unsure of how to say it, Kaori just reaches her arms around me and holds me tight... hugging me quietly to say 'goodbye'...

She has only a few years left, before her sight vanishes completely...

She'll start with New York, then Los Angeles.. and all the way to New England. Maybe live a while in Hawaii after that, and then... the world.

Feeling warm drops of her sadness rest upon my shoulder, I caress her smooth face as she starts to let go..

“You crybaby..”

I wipe away a tear upon her cheek, and let her bright smile beam forever in my heart..

I'll remember her... this beautiful person... my dearest friend, Kaori.

“I love you.”

I whisper softly with a kiss, tenderly given upon her silly head, telling her how much she means to me.


Wordlessly standing to our feet, with her hand safely in mine, I smile lovingly for her... and share one last walk with her through the park.....

“I-Iwanako..?”

The air carrying buttery hints of fresh breads from the Furukawa bakery, she seems reluctant to take another step, as if we're at the point of no return.

“What is it..?”

“Iwanako... what is it that you want most?”

Everything around me blurs brightly as I remember a half-hidden smile, my hand touched upon a scarred face, feeling tears and a kiss...

“..Iwanako? Are you.. crying?”

“I-I'm s-sorry... s-someone once said that before... someone.. dear to me.”

“Do you... do you remember him?”

“I-I-I.. I don't... but I want to... his shadow is still there, at every breath I take, every corner I make, with every beat of my heart...”


“....., can I tell you a story? Iwanako?”

It's not a happy story..... but I have to tell you.

It's now or never, 'all or nothing'.

Years before... a whole lifetime ago...

Waiting outside a hospital room, was a four year old boy, his father, and his aunt carrying a crying newborn.

His father was too despondent, so in his father's stead, the boy was the first to hold and comfort his baby sister, before the nurses took her into their care.

Waiting outside the hospital room, the boy, his father and his aunt heard the doctors finally give up, ...they did all they could, but the boy's mother couldn't be saved.

For four years, the boy looked after his sister, for four years he didn't have his mother anymore.

His aunt supported them as best she could. But the boy stopped going to school, and his father couldn't work.

Arranging for welfare services to take his sister and the boy next, the aunt angered the boy's father, ...though it had to be done.

But either out of desperation or pride, the father set fire to his home in the dead of night.

The boy woke up days later, sealed alive inside a 'glass coffin', clawing and screaming for hours until they restrained him.

Half of his body rotten and black, he should not have survived at all, forced to become the living horror looking back through the glass.

Listed as deceased by mistake, his aunt buried both him and his father, marking the boy's name over an empty grave.

For years he said nothing.. lying in bed all day in the orphanage, staring at the window glass in school.

A young classmate gave him a domino mask, a half-mask, and gently asked him to wear it for her.

Putting it on.. and seeing a different face in the glass, the boy could finally speak again.

'thank you..' he told her... the very first words of his new life...

Growing fond of her, the boy followed her wherever she went, and did whatever she asked him to, even if all she did was humiliate him in front of her friends.

Day after day, pranks after cruel teasing and name-calling, the boy still stayed by her side and didn't mind her mean friends.

Walking home together one day, one of the children went too far, and told the boy that if he dared to run across the busy street, his beloved classmate will give him a hug.

He did.

That was the last time he saw her alive, when she tried to block oncoming traffic from hitting him.

Blamed for that, blamed by her parents and all his teachers and fellow students, he entered middle school shunned and hated.

The teachers looked away when he was beaten for no reason, when the girls suggested all kinds of things that could provoke his asthma and kill him.

Mental and physical abuse taking their toll, the kind boy.. he slowly became a monster. Violent, cruel. ...Evil.

So many dark deeds, one of the worst things he did was.... purposely, he drove one of the girls to the brink of suicide, abusing her mind and body... subjecting her to psychological torture... He wanted someone to know how much he suffered.

By the time fate and chance brought his aunt to him again, the little boy had grown into a complete monster.

She took him away, from the school and orphanage, and he thought he would be thrown into an asylum or beaten and locked away. Born to be forgotten and left to rot.

She surprised him when she adopted him, bringing him home as her ward. The kind aunt gave the boy whatever he wanted, warmly loving him with all her heart, dearly telling him he was a beautiful human being.

After suffering and all those years lost, the boy learned again to trust in kindness... The boy.. was loved again.

Through a long journey... through healing and caring, he found himself a new family... our family.. of friends... electing himself as dedicated President of the student council, he did everything in his power to make sure no one was alone or suffering, while constantly pushing others like Rai to do better.

Then along came another face from the past, two years younger than us, a quiet girl who always kept to herself, seeming so ever lonely... his dear sister.. a light in his life thought lost forever.

Inviting her to join his merry band of crass class reps, she accepted and slowly started to trust us, learning to share joy and laughter, crying tears with us and being with family...

Sharing with the boy the beautiful love of trusting another, even if he was constantly forcing himself to become a better person, changing himself for her sake.

If only you could.. if only...

Something terrible happened, he...

There was an accident, and... and the boy knocked her in the heart..

Lying deep in coma, his sister had to undergo surgery to save her life, even if there was.. even if her dying heart would still give out, with or without a pacemaker.

Knowing that it was the end, knowing we would never see her again, he held her hand tightly, with Rai, the School Doctor, Hinata and Eita and his mother.. Lionel and I, Yuki and Acair, Shizuo, Sasha, Hitomi, Sachiko and Principal Katayama and her husband all came to say goodbye...

The boy loudly begged for her to wake up, to tell her he's sorry, to want to hear her voice again, to listen to her forgive him for all the terrible things he'd done...

He kept asking if a donated heart could be found, up until the last minute, in the darkest moment of that night, he.. asked the doctors one final question. They answered him honestly, before we realised in horror what he was going to do.

Beating him and knocking off his mask, Lionel and Rai warned him not to do something so stupid, begging him to change his mind.

But he wouldn't...

He just held his sister's hand... pressed her fingers to his bare face... and asked to just... 'trust him'.