𝐫𝐮𝐧𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐬 | 𝐤𝐚𝐠𝐚𝐦𝐢 𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐠𝐚 [UNDR EDT]

proem | II

᠃ ⚘᠂ ⚘ ˚ ⚘ ᠂ ⚘ ᠃

Everything after that  felt like some conjured false awakening—weeks and months blurring into  nothing but distant memories of a precious time no longer in my grasp  and I was forced to watch the pictures of Tetsuya's frigid expressions  as his isolation from others got bigger and bigger. All it took was one  month and it appeared that I had broken everything we once had, allowed  the distance to slink between us and, unbeknown to me, let it control  his very being.

So many times, I had tried to converse with him but every time I was shrugged off like some unwanted puppy. This was the end, I thought. And it was brought on by no one else other than me.

My father dragged me away from it all before I could so much as utter goodbye—through no fault of his own, rather, through my own panic-stricken daze and Tetsuya's pride which had no way of coming together to make amends during that time—and as we rode that fourteen-hour flight, my mind gave me no time to rest as it listed down every possible way I could've tried to get through to him. To not end it all on a sour note. 

None of it was my father's fault, however, although at the time he had been the scapegoat, and I used his excitement for this 'new beginning' as the reason I hadn't plucked up the courage to reconcile. We didn't talk for the whole journey; he sat to the left of me, reading his novel on ancient artefacts and paintings and I, knees brought up to my chin, looking out the window into a beautiful cloudless sky.

It wasn't as though the silence was uncomfortable. Oftentimes, we would sit in each other's company, silently, during those fleeting weekends when he would have time off from work and we would sit and paint together. And even though I enjoyed those moments in quietude, sometimes he was just so difficult to talk to.

Souma Hitana was a hard man to please—a forty-two-year-old office manager with a cold and foreboding exterior, built to administer others and direct them on their path to greatness—and as his daughter, gaining any sort of compliment from him had to be worked for. More than his colleagues, more than his friends, more than my teammates. Though, I suppose you could say I liked the challenge. His attitude made me determined, resolute in finding my own grandeur in his heart, so much so that I tried my hand at almost everything I could to find where my talents laid. Hockey, dancing, guitar, writing—you name it, I tried it all and at one point I nearly gave up. That was until we tried in running and I got the fastest time in the school. Father noticed me then, I was sure of it, though he never showed it completely, only a few smiles here and there and a pat on the back for good measure. But I found that was all I ever wanted.

When in Italy, securely hidden away from the rest of the family, he seemed so much happier and knowing he was calm and finally at peace made me relieved. For these eleven-years (the same amount of time I had been born) the death of my mother had hurt him so much that he had distanced himself from everyone who knew of her which included her side of the family who, he felt, would constantly question his well being and stability. These continued worries pushed down on him made him low to the point he had taken the opportunity to travel away from the people who cared for him the most, leaving us alone with only each other to rely on. Everyone else in Bologna were strangers and, to him, I was the final thread connecting him to the past.