That night I poured through the pictures and the memories.

I wanted validation more than anything; to prove to myself that Kirito's accusation had been no more than something I conjured myself out of anxiety and paranoia. I brought out all the pictures I could find of my girlfriends from the past 3 years -- purikura, professional photos, photos taken of them by me, of us by friends -- even pictures taken by Kirito. He made it a point to meet any girl I was dating, claiming I was too young to know what real love was and always warning me to be careful not to get them pregnant. Under no circumstances, he would say, was it acceptable for such a woman to bear my child. How many times had I heard that. I don't know if he took that stance because he was gay, because of the band, or because we had unintentionally rid ourselves of all parental influence long ago and no one else would say such things to me. At the time all of this happened my hormones were a little more under control, but when I was younger I had a bad habit of consoling myself with bodily pleasure and my brother knew this. I always suspected he had the same tendencies, but he could get away with it, for no man could bring around a child and demand he care for it. I'm sure he indulged himself frequently in Aiji's want to please, but there's no critiquing the safe haven of monogamy. At the very least, I was always in much more danger of screwing things up for the both of us than he ever was, despite the girls I chose. I mean, it wasn't as if I intentionally jumped from woman to woman, and my idea of "jumping" tended to be three months longer than all of my friends'. Looking at these pictures you saw nothing but smiles and affectionate gestures. I truly liked every one of them at the time, even now able to feel the affection for them I once did upon seeing their pictures. I admit, all of them looked like something out of homemaking magazines, the kind of well-mannered young women who placed their hands over their mouths when they laughed. I was attracted to that. I found the air of caring they gave off to be desirable, their tenderness something worthy of tedious amounts of courting. I knew women like this wouldn't treat me like I was some pit stop, play hard to get, take what they could get, and then move on. Unable to understand what I do now back then, I spent my time moving from perfectly good relationship to perfectly good relationship in an uncomfortable daze, always sure the next one was going to be The One. Yes, I felt for them, but there was always a certain feeling I had, or rather lack of it, that made it impossible for things to last more than half a year at most. It only reinforced what Kirito would murmur about women when I told him of our breakups, voice cold as he reassured me it wasn't my fault things didn't work. I would always disregard what he said as his attempts to console me, but eventually his harsh logic began lulling my subconscious into believing he was right. I was doing things right, I thought, I just hadn't found the right woman to share my life with. That fact was becoming more and more painfully apparent as I watched Kirito and Aiji grow closer in their love and I was wondering why sex felt like the only thing cementing my friendships into relationships. There was one time though, just one time, when things were different.

As I picked up the photo a nostalgic, sad smile crept onto my face. I traced the outline of her face with infinite tenderness.

The picture had been taken of us by my brother at Pallette Town, one of the few times I had attempted a sort of double date with him and Aiji. Embarrassed in the usual Japanese manner of having our intimacy caught on camera, she had blushed when I wrapped my arm around her and the light flashed. Aiji had reassured her what a handsome couple we made as she thanked them for the picture, Kirito quiet as he wound the film and handed the camera back to me. She was the only one I ever felt comfortable enough with to let her witness the secret of our band, especially considering Kirito's critical nature and Aiji, well, Aiji being how he was with my brother. Too much of a man to relate to my girlfriends, yet playing enough of the same role to seem like something to be judged against, I think reacting to him could be even harder than trying to ignore my brother's lifeless gaze. I hadn't cared though, because I loved her. God how I had loved Eiko, and my brother knew. I couldn't describe what made her different from the rest, but something did and it was beautiful. Maybe it was in her eyes, or her voice, or simply the way she smiled, the small action always enough to warm my heart no matter how trying the day had been. I had loved her with all my heart, secretly making plans to marry her despite the protest I knew my brother would make. And things had been perfect enough for little protest to be made, he knew, but what he didn't know I'm sure he would have beaten me soundly for upon finding out. I didn't know either, until it was too late. Amidst our happiness a child had been conceived, despite the fact that she had told me she was on the pill. As shameful as it sounds, as a man I can be pathetically unknowledgeable about a woman's body at times. Knowing simply that she was on some form of birth control, it had never occurred to me that it wouldn't work, that she would forget pills, or anything like that. It was my fault for being so lax with protection, but when you were with someone long enough....She hid it from me, that she was with child. If I remember correctly, she was pregnant in this picture, but Eiko had such a slim figure such things were impossible to notice. When I would ask why she was sick so frequently, she would tell me with a weak smile that the antibiotics she was on were causing it and I would stupidly tell her to ask the doctor for new ones. Why she hid it from me, I still don't know, but the stress of doing so eventually caused a miscarriage. With tears in her eyes and apologies on her lips she emerged from the restroom one night, almost incomprehensible as she buried her face in her pale hands. Of course I was alarmed as I asked what the matter was, but even then she felt she couldn't tell me what had happened. It was only in the morning when I found the note she left that I understood what I had been so ignorant to, that my child had come and gone in such a short amount of time. And that was all she left, a vow of her love for me. I never heard from her again.
Naturally, I was devastated. Beyond words. I couldn't find where she had gone to, who she had turned to, what her new number was. Later I read that it was fairly common for women to react like that when they had lost a child, but at that time I believed it to be all my fault. I thought that somewhere along the line I had come off as cold and uncaring, like I would be a bad father, that I hated children -- anything and everything. How could I have been so cruel to make it so that she couldn't tell me something that important? Something so sacred, that could have brought us only closer, and I had made it so she was petrified of revealing what should have been joyous to me. I hated myself. I wanted nothing more than to beg her forgiveness, to hold her, to tell her how much I loved her....Unable to cope with the ordeal and afraid of what I would do in my despair, I turned to my brother like always. As embarrassed as I am about it, despite knowing there is no real shame in a man crying, I spent those days in tears. I cried until I thought there was nothing left in me, my brother silently offering his shoulder for me to sob on. Worried about my health, he actually moved in with me for a short time, the only time he and Aiji had been separated since they had begun living together. Why did she leave? I would sob, Why am I such a horrible person? I wanted the world to open up and envelope me. I felt like buddha and kami alike had turned their backs on me for taking the life of the innocent and all I wanted was to join my child. The thought of death was always on my mind, and as I cursed myself repeatedly my brother listened in silence, countering my self-hatred with his embrace. I was always on the verge of confessing the miscarriage to him, wanting him to know just how much wrong I had done, but the cowardly part of me feared that if I confessed he too would look at me with contempt. Kirito was so kind to me at that time I didn't know what I would do if he withdrew his care. He even went so far as to sleep in my bed, the height of my anxiety causing nightmare after nightmare about Eiko and the child. I would have dreams of her throwing herself from some high place with my name on her lips, visions of us as a family as if nothing got wrong, or horrible things happening to her because I couldn't protect her. Like I had as a child I would wake with a start, cold sweat dampening my body as I moved closer to my brother. Even wrapped in sleep he responded to my shaken voice, lifting his arm habitually so I could crawl beneath it. That was the first time in my life I had experienced true heartache, and lovingly my brother had done all he could to wash away the grief. Unfortunately, it was my own incompetence that incurred my second experience with heartache amidst of the lowest point of my life.
I had taking to blurting all sorts of nonsensical things in my angst, and I'm sure I upset Kirito many times. However, there was only one time that I said something so foolish he spoke up. In lamenting about Eiko's love and my love for her, what had been lost and would never be regained, I eventually sobbed that I wanted a family and was tired of my current lifestyle. I wanted real love, I cried, the kind bound together by blood and creation.....That had angered Kirito. "Real love?" he had repeated in a low voice, his vindictive voice, "Blood and creation? I am your blood and I am your family, and to belittle the name of Pierrot like that when we used to starve to make this damn thing work is just blatant ungratefulness on your part." My sobs stopped as I looked to him with blood rimmed eyes. "How dare you talk of 'real love' while I sit here before you, my soul tearing as I listen to your inane want to disappear..." He wouldn't even look at me then. Kirito always looked at me when he spoke, even if it was to scold. "Women will always leave you Kohta," he whispered, "no matter how much you think you care for them, your 'family' collapsing with or without your consent. I am the only one who will never leave you, the only one whose heart beats in time with your own." In shock I listened to those words, the comfort of his embrace retracted, leaving me naked and vulnerable. He stood up to leave, face hidden in his hair as his words sunk into my mind. Kirito was always, always eloquent despite our education and even in his anger he spoke with the grace of an angel. It only made the pain more vivid, but I couldn't fully comprehend what was going on. He was...leaving? I watched as he walked away from me, his slender shoulders rigid as he opened my bedroom door. But, I thought desperately, Kirito just said he would never leave me, and here he was walking away from me....My brother who was so compassionate, here I was driving him away uncaringly, just as I had done to Eiko.....It was at that moment the horrid realization hit me that if Kirito left, if my own brother left me, there was nothing left to keep my fear of having killed my own child from becoming reality. He was my shield from myself, the only one I knew would tell me the truth and with him near me it was proof that I hadn't done something so reprehensible that...that I should be abandoned...

Before he could reach the front door I had bolted after him.

"Onii wait!" I cried, my hand latching onto his shoulder as if I could force myself back in his embrace. He paused, not turning to face me but willing to listen. "Wait, please, I'm sorry, please don't go," my voice cracked, tears coming from my eyes again. "I love you, I'm sorry, I love you, don't go..." I pressed myself against his back, my head resting on his shoulder dejectedly. "I love you," I murmured, the words falling from my mouth like a mantra broken only by sobs, "I love you so much..." I don't know how many times I said that as I stood there, my broken heart beating painfully as reality slipped away. I wanted to say those words to anyone, to Eiko, to the baby, to hear them said back to me....And yet despite my sheer despair, another part of me said those words solely for him, the kind of thing I would say when I was too young to know any better. I wanted to be held so badly, to feel his arms around me again and hear him tell me everything would be okay, that I was still loved by someone. Eventually, I felt his body shift and his hands tangle themselves in my matted blonde hair. "I didn't mean to scare you like that," he murmured back into my ear, words loving and sweet, "I would never leave you Kohta, I just..." He didn't need to finish the sentence, my soul already sagging in relief. That was the second time in my life that I had experienced true heartache, in that brief and paralyzing moment that I believed that my brother would leave me too.

My hand shook as I placed the photo back down, my eyes closing in remembrance.

She had been beautiful, and now she was gone. All I had left was Kirito.

I sorted through a few more pictures, still not through with what I wanted to accomplish. I couldn't look at any more of my girlfriends though. After seeing her, all memories became tinged with something sorrowful and I didn't want to pay improper homage to the other women who had made my life a little bit happier at the time. Instead, my fingers finally found what I had been searching for, a Polaroid of my brother and Aiji. When I had first taken the picture, I almost decided on framing it and displaying it in my small living room. Upon second thought though, I realized a picture of the band was better, just because I never knew who might end up coming over. This included my mother, who, while she was probably aware of what was going on between the two of them, wasn’t the type to want to acknowledge it if she didn’t have to. Aiji was not her idea of what a daughter-in-law should be, although the only thing she could validly complain about was his lack of a uterus. But that was another story.
The picture was intended to be something for the fan club magazine. It was a slow day, almost boring since Jun wasn’t happy with the guitar synching and we basically spent all of practice trying to figure that out. And by we I mean Jun, Aiji, and Kirito considering Takeo and I weren’t all that brilliant at such things. I had recently bought a new camera, digital (which at the time was more impressive) and everything, and I was eager to try it out. Weary from the repetition of working on the refrain, Kirito was making his way to the vending machine and Aiji was inconspicuously following him. At this point, the two weren’t together, but it was becoming increasingly obvious by the shy, flustered responses Aiji stumbled over whenever my brother talked to him that something more than affection was budding within him. I knew my brother felt the same way, or at least I hoped he did. The way he looked at Aiji wasn’t the way he looked at most people. But to my knowledge he hadn’t acted upon his feelings, and I was beginning to feel frustrated for my friend. Kirito was playing a game of cat and mouse, and it was clear to me who was the cat. “Ne Kirito, picture!” I had said with a grin, trying in my own way to relieve both boredom and do some sibling meddling. My brother rolled his eyes, but stopped walking. “Aiji Aiji, you too,” I signaled, and I could tell he was a little startled at the request. “Iya, Ko---” he began to protest, but my brother had spoken up. “Hnn, Aichu doesn’t want to be seen with me?” I saw the look on Aiji’s face. Again I found myself feeling sorry for him. “Can I get a picture or not?” I blurted hurriedly, trying to ignore Kirito tugging on our guitarist’s tail. They stood side by side, Aiji smiling faintly making a victory sign and my brother being stoic. “Say cheese,” I said with a tap on the button, but the resulting picture looked nothing like what I expected it to. Kirito had wrapped his arm around Aiji at the last second, bringing him close, and the look in Aiji’s eyes was far too intimate for something to be published, his wrist falling limp in surprise. I think I might have captured the actual moment in which Shinji fell in love with Murata Shinya. Needless to say, only three people have ever seen the picture. The other two began dating the next month.
Of course, this photo embodied my brother’s happiness to me, just like the photo of Eiko and myself embodied what used to be my happiness. But it also tugged at me in another way, a way I wanted to make sure I wasn’t skimming over and unknowingly adding fuel to the fire in Kirito’s eyes earlier. This was one of the only pictures I owned of Aiji. Sure, I had tons of pictures of the band as a whole, mainly from magazine shoots and whatnot, but most of my pictures were either of my brother and I, me with random friends, or just me doing one thing or another. And I would have to say, if I was attracted to men, this would be the photo in which Aiji looked the most beautiful. Yet looking at him, even if I covered the ever-ominous presence of my brother beside him, I could find nothing rousing in his large eyes and demure smile. Even the blush cresting his cheeks, the gentle manner in which he was holding his hand…it did nothing for me. I couldn’t envision what I had mistakenly done so earlier. I couldn’t imagine touching his body, stroking his hair, even kissing his cheek. He was too much of my brother’s for my body to react that way, no matter what situation I tried to create in my head. That didn’t mean that I didn’t care about him though. I mean, there was no way I could say I felt nothing at all for Aiji, even if it wasn’t my brother demanding to hear it. He was a good friend of mine. He helped make the best thing in my life work, he put life into my bass -- he was a voice of reason behind my brother’s irrationality. He was a much a part of Pierrot as any of us, and that made him family, at least in my eyes. Most of all, I respected what he did for my brother outside of the band. To make him happy when I had seen Kirito grow increasingly despondent…It was something I couldn’t put a price on. I loved him because my brother loved him, because he did so much for the most important person in my life. That was a natural reaction, to me. I would do anything for Aiji in that respect, but that was where I felt it ended. A love absent of lust. I believed that was possible, at the time, and I still think most people can achieve it. So it made sense, when I felt such things for him, that I was inwardly distressed at what was going on in our band. The way Takeo looked at Aiji with such disgust, the way Jun looked about to flinch if the other man ever touched him or attempted to tease him like he had when we first got together. I wanted them to see this picture, hold it in Takeo’s face and go “Look, this is Aiji!”…I wanted them to see the Aiji I knew, this man who made my brother so happy, who was charming when the situation called for it and quiet when it didn’t. When we would all go out together, the three of us, I couldn’t understand why they wouldn’t like him. He could say things that brought a smile to even my brother’s face. He had class, even when clad in just a jeans and t-shirt, which was a far cry from me. It was like he was another person at practice nowadays….
He hadn’t been like that, years ago. I wondered if Jun and Takeo even remembered. He was the Aiji I still knew with them then…..I just didn’t understand why things were the way they were. When he was such a great guy to be around, how he managed to make people he used to consider his friends sick. How he could act so crass and shallow, so distant and egotistical when I knew inside, that wasn’t him. A person like that couldn’t have been so kind to Eiko, couldn’t believe in Kirito the way he did, call me just to make sure I was okay, or even keep his mouth shut when it could be so easy to exploit the relationship he had with my brother. When I thought about it, when I looked at this picture….He just wasn’t like that, and I wanted to make them remember, because I loved him. I wanted to tell them it wasn’t his fault, that he was still a good person - that something else had to be going on. Just because he had started acting this way since-

I stopped my thought there. How was I about to finish that?

….since he started dating Kirito, it didn’t mean he had changed.

…since he had started dating Kirito….

I shook my head. What was I trying to imply? I was being stupid again. Sure his behavior may have changed since he was with my brother, but it wasn’t Kirito’s fault. As if he could cause such a thing. Blaming my brother, what was wrong with me….He was right to question me about Aiji, I thought, if I was going to harbor thoughts like that.

I was thinking too much. I decided to put all of the photos back in their respective albums and boxes and go to sleep, before any more uncomfortable thoughts filtered into my head.

When I got up to put everything back into the small cabinet, I made the mistake of trying to balance the photo albums on top of the boxes. As a result, something had to give with my less-than-agile self and the photo albums slid off and crashed back into the floor. I cursed, contemplated leaving the mess there, but then one last picture caught my eye. I stooped back down to pick it up, with a little more care than I had shown everything else. It was old.

It was of my childhood.

I can’t believe I had stashed away that photo. Another smile crept onto my face, but there was no sadness or confusion clouding it, just like the two forces never affected me at the time this was taken. Here was bliss, the kind of bliss the roughhousing of siblings riled up with hope incurred. Here Kirito smiled as wide as I did, smiled like he had no concerns other than to do so. It was a sight, seeing us young again, clad in our snow encrusted school uniforms, hair black as coal and cut conservatively about our faces. Kirito was trying to grow his longer, much to my father’s discontent, and I wanted to follow his example like always. I remembered that day, because it was a day I felt life had been breathed back into my brother, the kind I hadn’t seen possess him for awhile. He had confided in me the previous week about an idea he had pondered for some time and had finally decided to act upon. He was going to quit school, he told me, so that he could go to Tokyo and concentrate on his guitar and writing music. Kirito said he wanted to make music, that he wanted a band and an audience and make more of himself than our village had to offer. I of course, was dumbstruck by the idea. I hadn’t envisioned leaving home, even though I had started becoming as obsessed with my bass as he was with his guitar. I thought maybe we’d just stop fiddling around with side projects and make a band where we were maybe, if he wanted me around. But Tokyo? That was a long way away and even more money that we didn’t have from where we were. I was in awe that he had the balls to even consider something like that, let alone state it was going to be his plan of action. But when I thought about it, and I thought about it every waking moment for that week, I couldn’t imagine not having him around. I couldn’t imagine him leaving me, going off to Tokyo while I rotted in the countryside of Hokkaido watching snow huts instead of skyscrapers. It almost sent me into a panic, because I knew by the way he had talked about it that he was going to do it no matter what anyone said. He had never liked school to begin with, but I think it had more to do with his sexuality than not being able to do the work. I, on the other hand, was just a trouble maker and would rather fool around than do work, even though I meant no harm. Without Kirito’s direction, I’m sure I would have become a delinquent somewhere down the line, and when I tried to imagine life without his chastising, it just didn’t seem like much of a life anymore. It goes without saying that I soon told him I wanted to come along, even if I sucked too much at bass and was going to finish school later. I told him I would work, quit school the same time he did, do whatever he wanted me to so he didn’t leave me behind. I was surprised, although incredibly pleased, when he said he wouldn’t have gone anywhere without me.
Hence the excitement in the picture. It was the beginning of winter, but snow had already started blanketing everything in fall. The chill of the air was no match for the warmth in our hearts, as cliché as that might sound. Kirito had been elated since we had finalized our plans for the future, and it showed in his playful and more affectionate mannerisms towards me. Despite our mother having told us a million times not to screw around in the front yard in our uniforms, when I felt the snow being packed down in my collar I knew Kirito was looking for a fight. I was already bigger than him but there was a strength in my brother that gave me a run for my money, and I’m sure it had something to do with his martial arts training. Before I knew it I was on the ground, laughing and cursing and all the while trying to shove snow down his clothing as well. I could hear my mother yelling at us from the front door, but we could have cared less. He was hissing things about teaching me to be a good little brother and I was yelling things like I was going to throw his guitar out the window, but in the end exhaustion beat us both. I guess our mother, tired of wasting her energy on yelling, decided a photograph would be a good idea instead. She caught us walking to the door, hair disheveled and riddled with snow, our uniforms a mess and our bags haphazardly thrown around our bodies. Kirito was leaning against me heavily, and I remember the sound of his panting in the cold, feeling victorious just because the sound was foreign to my ears. When we saw the camera, my fingers immediately went into a V and I grinned from ear to ear, throwing an arm around Kirito’s neck in some sort of mock domination. My brother was looking up at me, laughing at how goofy I looked knowing him, but he was smiling nonetheless. We looked like brothers, close and content and intimate with our secrets. I briefly wondered if I had any other photo in which the same emotions were captured between us.
I’m sure our mother gave me this photo instead of Kirito because I was more apt to keep in touch with her, but I wondered if he had ever seen it. I stared at it fondly for a few more minutes. I’m sure it was something he would want to see, or at least have a copy of. I was especially selfless about things that concerned our childhood with Kirito, just because I had no concept of bad blood between us, and whatever concept I did have was always overwhelmed by my admiration for him. Tomorrow night I would bring the picture along with me, I decided. Maybe Aiji would want to see it, just for a laugh.

I stifled a yawn.

I figured I could clean up the mess tomorrow as the need to sleep hit me harder than it had in a long time. My mind was already drained by having so many memories flood my brain and the oblivion sleep offered sounded great. Now that I knew Kirito had been misguided in his accusations, I thought, I was sure things could be settled tomorrow night and that would be the end of it.

As usual though, I had no idea what my brother had in store for me.

~*~

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