Courage
This is never going on ffnet... I'm not sure why I'm bothering to post it at all. Gen/Angst fic between Yamato and his father. Definitely OOC; I started this like something over year ago.
Digimon - PG-13 - English - General/Angst - Words: 2871 - Published: 12-04-05
Disclaimer: Digimon is not mine. It’s Toei Animation’s, and Saban unfortunately got ahold of it.. God save us all.
Author’s Notes: Gen fic between Mr. Ishida and Yamato. It's out of character; I offer no excuse for that. Mentions self-injury and rape. Read at your own risk XD
Courage
by: butterflie
Otousan,
I didn’t know of any other way to tell you this. I’ve tried so many times. So, so many times. I’ve left hints, clues, but you don’t seem to pick up on them. I’ve asked you to come home early, to you that means midnight. Maybe that’s being a little unfair, but it’s unfair of you to not be here when I need you. And I need you now, but again, you’re not here.
The truth is, Otousan, I cut myself. I know what you’re probably thinking. I’m crazy, I’m suicidal, I want attention, blah blah blah. Not true. I’m not suicidal, I’m definitely not crazy, and if I wanted attention I would have been flaunting the scars on my arms for the world to see. But I hid it, I hid it all so very well. And no one knew. No one suspected. Not you, not Taichi, not even Takeru. No one knows. Except now you do.
Why do I cut myself? It’s a good question. Fair. The truth is, I don’t know anymore. It used to be to escape. I wanted to escape the pain, the awful pain inside of me that won’t go away. I wanted to get the dirty blood out of my body. I wanted to be pure again. I finally learned that cutting myself isn’t going to make the memory of him go away. What he did to me, it will always be there. No matter how hard I try, no matter what I do, he’s still there in my mind. I can still feel his hand on me, touching me, caressing, violating. Taking from me what I never wanted to give to him. Ruining me forever, staining my soul. He made me dirty, and there wasn’t a damned thing I could do to stop it. And I can never be clean again.
I wanted to tell you, Otousan, but I didn’t know how. The hours you were home never seemed right. We never talked all that much anyways. It seems sad to say that. A father and a son, living together in the same small apartment, and yet we barely know each other. You’re my father, and I don’t even know what your favourite food is. And I dare say you know everything about me. There’ve always been so many things I had to say, so many things I needed to talk about, but never could. Because I didn’t know how. So this is my last attempt to talk now.
Please, Otousan. I need your help. I’m sick of going on like this. I’m sick of these scars, I’m sick of needing, sick of being lost in memories and getting sucked into a neverending cycle. If you care, if you care at all about me, stay home from work tomorrow. I’ll be there then. For tonight, I’m staying at Taichi’s. Please don’t bother me. Use the time to think.
Your Son,
Ishida Yamato
I reread the letter, trying hard to make what I was seeing an illusion, a cruel mirage that my tired, over-worked brain was producing. But I knew from the tears on my cheeks that this precious, albeit painful, letter from my son was very real.
Yamato cuts himself. How could I have missed that? And the other part... “I can still feel his hand on me, touching me, caressing, violating.” Jesus. It’s quite clear what he means from that. How could I have missed that? Because I wasn’t there, that’s why. He’s right. I’m never there when he needs me.
Of course I’d stay home tomorrow. He’s my son, and I love him. I have to be there for him. But he cuts himself. There had to have been tons of signs. How did I miss them?
I wanted to call him, I needed badly to call him. I didn’t understand. I was confused, hurting. But there was no one to turn to. After the divorce with Natsuko, I shut myself off from everyone completely, emersing myself in my work, blocking out all the pain. This is what comes of it.
Yamato... cuts himself. On his arms. What does he use? How often does he do it? How long has this been going on? Why did he never tell anyone before? How did he hide it so well? What did the scars look like? How serious were the cuts, how deep? Did it hurt? What would happen now? Could he stop? So many questions running through my head, and I didn’t have an answer for any of them.
Though I wouldn’t get an answer for most of them tonight, I could find the answers to the last two. Setting down the letter ever so gently, I then made my way into Yamato’s room and booted up his computer. He had it password protected, but I knew it anyways. I quickly got online and put in a search for “cutting”. Mostly I got junk or things not related to Yamato’s cutting. What else would it be called? I thought for a moment.. Yamato cuts himself.. injures himself.. I put in a search for self-injury, and quickly got many results for what I needed. I went to a site called “Secret Shame”. One of the first things I found seemed to coincide with what Yamato had said in his letter: Most self-injurers are not suicidal. A load off my mind.
I browsed through the site for hours, looking at the various pages of information, seeing how it related to Yamato. The site had a forum, so I spent some time wading through the information there. A lot of the stuff scared me, but it also gave me hope. This cutting Yamato did, he could stop. Eventually.
Still, I went to bed with a heavy heart. And did not sleep.
+-+-+-+
I tensed as I heard the door open. It was still rather early in the morning, but I was already up. I was pretty much just lying in bed worrying anyways, so I just decided to wait at the kitchen table for Yamato instead.
I heard him say “Tadaima” softly, though I don’t think he thought I’d be up or even here at this hour. But I was. My son needed me, and I was finally going to be there for him.
He walked into the kitchen and saw me sitting at the table. For a moment, I could see the desperate confusion in his eyes. My heart ached for him. He looked at me, trying to pretend everything was normal. My eyes flew to his arms. Long sleeves. Even though it was summer. I’d never thought much of it before. Why hadn’t I realized? When was the last time I saw Yamato in a short-sleeved shirt? I couldn’t remember. A long time. Too long. I raised my eyes back up to meet his.
He swallowed, watched me watching him watch me. The moment was tense, with neither of us wanting to break it. Words weren’t really needed, it seemed. The matter lay before us, exposed, raw.
We could have gone on staring at each other forever, but then the moment passed and he spoke. “You read it. The letter.”
I nodded. “Yes, I read it.” My eyes strayed back to his arms again. They were drawn to them, it seemed. Wondering what those innocent sleeves hid underneath. Wondering how I could have missed all the signs so easily. Wondering why he finally told me. Wondering if he’d tell me more.
He let out a little surprised noise, and I looked up at him, curious. “What?”
“Otousan...” Now he looked pained. Just then I felt something wet drip onto my hand. I raised the hand, touched my cheek. Wetness there. I was crying. Again. And I hadn’t even been aware of it.
Yamato came towards me, and then did something that shocked me, something he hadn’t done since he was very little. He hugged me. Clumsily, I put my arms around him and hugged him back. Still crying. “I’m sorry, Otousan..” he murmured. “I never meant to hurt you. I didn’t want to worry you. I just... I had to tell someone..”
“It’s okay, Yamato,” I reassured him. “It’s okay. I’m glad you told me. Thank you.”
He pulled back from me, letting me go, and I had to restrain myself from tightening my grip on him. It’d been a long time since I’d had comfort from anyone. I’d forgotten how nice it felt, how loved and wanted it made me feel. His eyes searched mine for a long while. I wondered what he was looking for in them, what he hoped to find. I guess whatever it was, he found it, because he nodded to himself and smiled, ever so softly. It amazed me that he could smile at a time like this. It amazed me even more that he was actually smiling. The last time I could recall Yamato smiling was even longer than the last time I could recall him wearing short-sleeves.
“Come on,” he said, and started walking towards the living room.
“Why?” I asked, though I got up and began to follow him.
“The couch is a bit more comfortable,” was his only reply.
I just shrugged and sat down next to him. There was some silence for a bit. I had so many questions, needed so many answers, but didn’t know where or how to begin. Didn’t know what he’d be willing to answer. Didn’t know if he’d answer anything at all. Didn’t know if there was more than he was telling. I watched him fidget beside me, wondering what was going through his mind. He wasn’t looking at me now. Instead, he was staring around him at the livingroom as if he hadn’t spent the last thirteen years of his life living in it.
“Can I see them?”
I could tell the question caught him off guard, though he gave no sign of showing it in his reply. “Why? They’re just like all the other scars out there. Deep, not very pretty, and they tell a gruesome story.”
“Yes, but you’re my son, and you put them there yourself. I’d like to see them. It’d give me an idea of just how much you’ve tried to escape, as you put it.”
He sighed, and glanced up at me. “It’s really not pretty, Otousan. Are you really sure you want to see them?”
“Please, Yamato.”
He didn’t say anything else, just reached down and pulled off his shirt. I had to fight not to give away any visible reaction. To say it wasn’t pretty was an understatement. A major understatement. Pretty much all I could see was scars. Scars all up and down the whole length of his arms, scars that twisted and dug deep and overlapped one another. Scars that told a story I was afraid to hear. Older scars hidden beneath fresher, newer scars. Scars marred by angry red lines that looked barely a day old. I focused on those.
“Are these new?”
He nodded. “Yesterday. After I wrote the letter. I was scared.”
I didn’t really know what to say to that, though I knew I had to say something or risk alienating him with my silence.
“Why were you scared?”
He shrugged. “Didn’t know how you’d take it.. the fact that I cut, or... the other thing.”
“The other thing..” I murmured. “What happened? How long ago?”
He sighed, looked away for a moment before looking back at me. “It was.. about six months ago. I was coming home from a late band practice. It was going to rain soon, I could tell, so I took a shortcut through an alley. I guess I shouldn’t have...” He went silent, eyes seeing things in the past that to him were still as fresh as newly mowed grass.
“Someone raped you in the alleyway?”
He half-heartedly lifted a shoulder. “Yeah, to put it bluntly. Just some guy I didn’t know, had never seen before in my life. Jumped me, held me down, gagged my mouth. Took me then and there. I try not to think about is so much anymore.”
It amazed me that he could be so calm talking about such an act of violation against both his mind and body.
“So what? Then you begin to cut yourself?”
He laughed, surprising me. “Well, it’s not like it was right away! I didn’t go “Oh, I’ve just been raped, I have to take up cutting myself now!” It was more like, I was laying on my bed, feeling pretty depressed, my mind constantly replaying the events over and over. I had a boxcutter blade in my hand, I don’t remember where I’d picked it up. I was playing with it, turning it over, staring at it. And then I just kind of thought, “I wonder what it would feel like if I cut myself with this? How sharp would it be? Would it hurt a lot?” So I cut myself to see. It didn’t hurt. I thought maybe I hadn’t done it hard enough. So I did it twice more, deeper. It still didn’t hurt, but I noticed that I was feeling a little bit better.” He grinned wryly. “So I just kept doing it, and I felt better. And then when I felt down, I’d do it.. Things just kind of evolved.”
“Why did it take so long for you to come to me?” I asked him quietly.
"I... I don't know. It just didn't seem like something I could tell you, really.. I tried, before, a couple of times.. but it just never was right.."
"So why tell me now? What changed your mind?"
"Because," -and he was a lot more serious now than he was just a few moments ago- "like I said in the letter. I'm so sick of going on like this. Sick of pretending I'm happy, everything's great, the world is wonderful! I'm so fucking sick of having to be someone I'm not, it could drive me to suicide!"
Jekyll to Hyde, what was this? I was starting to get a bit frightened. Yamato was a lot more out of control than he'd seemed. I was starting to feel as if I didn't really know him at all. I'd never seen my son act like this. "I thought you said it wasn't about suicide," I said, a albeit a bit timidly.
"It's not, dammit! Don't go off and think you need to put me on some stupid suicide watch! I'm not going to die, I don't want to die, dammit! But I'm just so tired of living this lie, I just want to be me..."
Now he sounded world-weary. I wasn't really sure what to do. I'd never faced a situation like this before. What should I say, what should I do? Should I comfort him? Should I just sit here and pretend to understand what it was like? Should I just say nothing and let him continue to rant? What did other parents in my situation say, do?
"I.. I don't really know what to say.."
Another wry grin. "I don't really expect you to, 'tousan. Heck, I didn't even know what to say myself. I didn't know how to tell you without making you worry or think it was your fault, or worse.."
"Worse what?"
"Worse, hate me," he whispered softly. "I was afraid you'd hate me, be mad at me if I admitted what I was doing." Then he looked up at me fearfully. "You're not, are you?"
I just shook my head. "I'm not mad, Yamato. Worried and afraid for you, and more shocked than anything else, but not mad. Never mad. Never hateful."
He looked back down at his lap, absently fingering the scars on his left arm. I saw him swallow a bit nervously. "Good. Cos I was really scared you would be."
I shook my head, debating the wisdom of pulling him into a reassuring hug. Yamato was not really one for physical contact, as he had made all too clear in his younger years. "I could never hate you, Yamato," I reiterated.
He lifted up one shoulder a bit, then let it fall back down. "That's good to know..."
There was a silence then, as we sat there, each a bit uncomfortable with such an emotional talk. Neither of us really knew how to handle it. At last though, he spoke up again. "You... you will help me, right?" he asked in a small voice. "I really don't want to be alone with this anymore..."
It pained me to see my son suffering like that. The last time he looked so lost and confused was when Natsuko and I separated him and Takeru. I'd sworn then that I'd protect him from such pain again, but now reality was slamming in my face the painful fact of my failure.
I wanted to help him. I wanted to take that suffering away from him. I wanted to see him smiling and happy; I never wanted to see him like this again.
I gave him a brave, confident smile. "Yes," I said softly. "I will help you. You're not going to be alone in this anymore."
finis
Author's Notes: oh yay. This is so OOC and such shit. I don't really care anymore; I'm pretty much out of the Digimon fandom. All that's left now is to finish the fics I had intended to finish. I still love Digimon, but I doubt I will be starting anything new XD;
Digimon - PG-13 - English - General/Angst - Words: 2871 - Published: 12-04-05
Disclaimer: Digimon is not mine. It’s Toei Animation’s, and Saban unfortunately got ahold of it.. God save us all.
Author’s Notes: Gen fic between Mr. Ishida and Yamato. It's out of character; I offer no excuse for that. Mentions self-injury and rape. Read at your own risk XD
Courage
by: butterflie
Otousan,
I didn’t know of any other way to tell you this. I’ve tried so many times. So, so many times. I’ve left hints, clues, but you don’t seem to pick up on them. I’ve asked you to come home early, to you that means midnight. Maybe that’s being a little unfair, but it’s unfair of you to not be here when I need you. And I need you now, but again, you’re not here.
The truth is, Otousan, I cut myself. I know what you’re probably thinking. I’m crazy, I’m suicidal, I want attention, blah blah blah. Not true. I’m not suicidal, I’m definitely not crazy, and if I wanted attention I would have been flaunting the scars on my arms for the world to see. But I hid it, I hid it all so very well. And no one knew. No one suspected. Not you, not Taichi, not even Takeru. No one knows. Except now you do.
Why do I cut myself? It’s a good question. Fair. The truth is, I don’t know anymore. It used to be to escape. I wanted to escape the pain, the awful pain inside of me that won’t go away. I wanted to get the dirty blood out of my body. I wanted to be pure again. I finally learned that cutting myself isn’t going to make the memory of him go away. What he did to me, it will always be there. No matter how hard I try, no matter what I do, he’s still there in my mind. I can still feel his hand on me, touching me, caressing, violating. Taking from me what I never wanted to give to him. Ruining me forever, staining my soul. He made me dirty, and there wasn’t a damned thing I could do to stop it. And I can never be clean again.
I wanted to tell you, Otousan, but I didn’t know how. The hours you were home never seemed right. We never talked all that much anyways. It seems sad to say that. A father and a son, living together in the same small apartment, and yet we barely know each other. You’re my father, and I don’t even know what your favourite food is. And I dare say you know everything about me. There’ve always been so many things I had to say, so many things I needed to talk about, but never could. Because I didn’t know how. So this is my last attempt to talk now.
Please, Otousan. I need your help. I’m sick of going on like this. I’m sick of these scars, I’m sick of needing, sick of being lost in memories and getting sucked into a neverending cycle. If you care, if you care at all about me, stay home from work tomorrow. I’ll be there then. For tonight, I’m staying at Taichi’s. Please don’t bother me. Use the time to think.
Your Son,
Ishida Yamato
I reread the letter, trying hard to make what I was seeing an illusion, a cruel mirage that my tired, over-worked brain was producing. But I knew from the tears on my cheeks that this precious, albeit painful, letter from my son was very real.
Yamato cuts himself. How could I have missed that? And the other part... “I can still feel his hand on me, touching me, caressing, violating.” Jesus. It’s quite clear what he means from that. How could I have missed that? Because I wasn’t there, that’s why. He’s right. I’m never there when he needs me.
Of course I’d stay home tomorrow. He’s my son, and I love him. I have to be there for him. But he cuts himself. There had to have been tons of signs. How did I miss them?
I wanted to call him, I needed badly to call him. I didn’t understand. I was confused, hurting. But there was no one to turn to. After the divorce with Natsuko, I shut myself off from everyone completely, emersing myself in my work, blocking out all the pain. This is what comes of it.
Yamato... cuts himself. On his arms. What does he use? How often does he do it? How long has this been going on? Why did he never tell anyone before? How did he hide it so well? What did the scars look like? How serious were the cuts, how deep? Did it hurt? What would happen now? Could he stop? So many questions running through my head, and I didn’t have an answer for any of them.
Though I wouldn’t get an answer for most of them tonight, I could find the answers to the last two. Setting down the letter ever so gently, I then made my way into Yamato’s room and booted up his computer. He had it password protected, but I knew it anyways. I quickly got online and put in a search for “cutting”. Mostly I got junk or things not related to Yamato’s cutting. What else would it be called? I thought for a moment.. Yamato cuts himself.. injures himself.. I put in a search for self-injury, and quickly got many results for what I needed. I went to a site called “Secret Shame”. One of the first things I found seemed to coincide with what Yamato had said in his letter: Most self-injurers are not suicidal. A load off my mind.
I browsed through the site for hours, looking at the various pages of information, seeing how it related to Yamato. The site had a forum, so I spent some time wading through the information there. A lot of the stuff scared me, but it also gave me hope. This cutting Yamato did, he could stop. Eventually.
Still, I went to bed with a heavy heart. And did not sleep.
+-+-+-+
I tensed as I heard the door open. It was still rather early in the morning, but I was already up. I was pretty much just lying in bed worrying anyways, so I just decided to wait at the kitchen table for Yamato instead.
I heard him say “Tadaima” softly, though I don’t think he thought I’d be up or even here at this hour. But I was. My son needed me, and I was finally going to be there for him.
He walked into the kitchen and saw me sitting at the table. For a moment, I could see the desperate confusion in his eyes. My heart ached for him. He looked at me, trying to pretend everything was normal. My eyes flew to his arms. Long sleeves. Even though it was summer. I’d never thought much of it before. Why hadn’t I realized? When was the last time I saw Yamato in a short-sleeved shirt? I couldn’t remember. A long time. Too long. I raised my eyes back up to meet his.
He swallowed, watched me watching him watch me. The moment was tense, with neither of us wanting to break it. Words weren’t really needed, it seemed. The matter lay before us, exposed, raw.
We could have gone on staring at each other forever, but then the moment passed and he spoke. “You read it. The letter.”
I nodded. “Yes, I read it.” My eyes strayed back to his arms again. They were drawn to them, it seemed. Wondering what those innocent sleeves hid underneath. Wondering how I could have missed all the signs so easily. Wondering why he finally told me. Wondering if he’d tell me more.
He let out a little surprised noise, and I looked up at him, curious. “What?”
“Otousan...” Now he looked pained. Just then I felt something wet drip onto my hand. I raised the hand, touched my cheek. Wetness there. I was crying. Again. And I hadn’t even been aware of it.
Yamato came towards me, and then did something that shocked me, something he hadn’t done since he was very little. He hugged me. Clumsily, I put my arms around him and hugged him back. Still crying. “I’m sorry, Otousan..” he murmured. “I never meant to hurt you. I didn’t want to worry you. I just... I had to tell someone..”
“It’s okay, Yamato,” I reassured him. “It’s okay. I’m glad you told me. Thank you.”
He pulled back from me, letting me go, and I had to restrain myself from tightening my grip on him. It’d been a long time since I’d had comfort from anyone. I’d forgotten how nice it felt, how loved and wanted it made me feel. His eyes searched mine for a long while. I wondered what he was looking for in them, what he hoped to find. I guess whatever it was, he found it, because he nodded to himself and smiled, ever so softly. It amazed me that he could smile at a time like this. It amazed me even more that he was actually smiling. The last time I could recall Yamato smiling was even longer than the last time I could recall him wearing short-sleeves.
“Come on,” he said, and started walking towards the living room.
“Why?” I asked, though I got up and began to follow him.
“The couch is a bit more comfortable,” was his only reply.
I just shrugged and sat down next to him. There was some silence for a bit. I had so many questions, needed so many answers, but didn’t know where or how to begin. Didn’t know what he’d be willing to answer. Didn’t know if he’d answer anything at all. Didn’t know if there was more than he was telling. I watched him fidget beside me, wondering what was going through his mind. He wasn’t looking at me now. Instead, he was staring around him at the livingroom as if he hadn’t spent the last thirteen years of his life living in it.
“Can I see them?”
I could tell the question caught him off guard, though he gave no sign of showing it in his reply. “Why? They’re just like all the other scars out there. Deep, not very pretty, and they tell a gruesome story.”
“Yes, but you’re my son, and you put them there yourself. I’d like to see them. It’d give me an idea of just how much you’ve tried to escape, as you put it.”
He sighed, and glanced up at me. “It’s really not pretty, Otousan. Are you really sure you want to see them?”
“Please, Yamato.”
He didn’t say anything else, just reached down and pulled off his shirt. I had to fight not to give away any visible reaction. To say it wasn’t pretty was an understatement. A major understatement. Pretty much all I could see was scars. Scars all up and down the whole length of his arms, scars that twisted and dug deep and overlapped one another. Scars that told a story I was afraid to hear. Older scars hidden beneath fresher, newer scars. Scars marred by angry red lines that looked barely a day old. I focused on those.
“Are these new?”
He nodded. “Yesterday. After I wrote the letter. I was scared.”
I didn’t really know what to say to that, though I knew I had to say something or risk alienating him with my silence.
“Why were you scared?”
He shrugged. “Didn’t know how you’d take it.. the fact that I cut, or... the other thing.”
“The other thing..” I murmured. “What happened? How long ago?”
He sighed, looked away for a moment before looking back at me. “It was.. about six months ago. I was coming home from a late band practice. It was going to rain soon, I could tell, so I took a shortcut through an alley. I guess I shouldn’t have...” He went silent, eyes seeing things in the past that to him were still as fresh as newly mowed grass.
“Someone raped you in the alleyway?”
He half-heartedly lifted a shoulder. “Yeah, to put it bluntly. Just some guy I didn’t know, had never seen before in my life. Jumped me, held me down, gagged my mouth. Took me then and there. I try not to think about is so much anymore.”
It amazed me that he could be so calm talking about such an act of violation against both his mind and body.
“So what? Then you begin to cut yourself?”
He laughed, surprising me. “Well, it’s not like it was right away! I didn’t go “Oh, I’ve just been raped, I have to take up cutting myself now!” It was more like, I was laying on my bed, feeling pretty depressed, my mind constantly replaying the events over and over. I had a boxcutter blade in my hand, I don’t remember where I’d picked it up. I was playing with it, turning it over, staring at it. And then I just kind of thought, “I wonder what it would feel like if I cut myself with this? How sharp would it be? Would it hurt a lot?” So I cut myself to see. It didn’t hurt. I thought maybe I hadn’t done it hard enough. So I did it twice more, deeper. It still didn’t hurt, but I noticed that I was feeling a little bit better.” He grinned wryly. “So I just kept doing it, and I felt better. And then when I felt down, I’d do it.. Things just kind of evolved.”
“Why did it take so long for you to come to me?” I asked him quietly.
"I... I don't know. It just didn't seem like something I could tell you, really.. I tried, before, a couple of times.. but it just never was right.."
"So why tell me now? What changed your mind?"
"Because," -and he was a lot more serious now than he was just a few moments ago- "like I said in the letter. I'm so sick of going on like this. Sick of pretending I'm happy, everything's great, the world is wonderful! I'm so fucking sick of having to be someone I'm not, it could drive me to suicide!"
Jekyll to Hyde, what was this? I was starting to get a bit frightened. Yamato was a lot more out of control than he'd seemed. I was starting to feel as if I didn't really know him at all. I'd never seen my son act like this. "I thought you said it wasn't about suicide," I said, a albeit a bit timidly.
"It's not, dammit! Don't go off and think you need to put me on some stupid suicide watch! I'm not going to die, I don't want to die, dammit! But I'm just so tired of living this lie, I just want to be me..."
Now he sounded world-weary. I wasn't really sure what to do. I'd never faced a situation like this before. What should I say, what should I do? Should I comfort him? Should I just sit here and pretend to understand what it was like? Should I just say nothing and let him continue to rant? What did other parents in my situation say, do?
"I.. I don't really know what to say.."
Another wry grin. "I don't really expect you to, 'tousan. Heck, I didn't even know what to say myself. I didn't know how to tell you without making you worry or think it was your fault, or worse.."
"Worse what?"
"Worse, hate me," he whispered softly. "I was afraid you'd hate me, be mad at me if I admitted what I was doing." Then he looked up at me fearfully. "You're not, are you?"
I just shook my head. "I'm not mad, Yamato. Worried and afraid for you, and more shocked than anything else, but not mad. Never mad. Never hateful."
He looked back down at his lap, absently fingering the scars on his left arm. I saw him swallow a bit nervously. "Good. Cos I was really scared you would be."
I shook my head, debating the wisdom of pulling him into a reassuring hug. Yamato was not really one for physical contact, as he had made all too clear in his younger years. "I could never hate you, Yamato," I reiterated.
He lifted up one shoulder a bit, then let it fall back down. "That's good to know..."
There was a silence then, as we sat there, each a bit uncomfortable with such an emotional talk. Neither of us really knew how to handle it. At last though, he spoke up again. "You... you will help me, right?" he asked in a small voice. "I really don't want to be alone with this anymore..."
It pained me to see my son suffering like that. The last time he looked so lost and confused was when Natsuko and I separated him and Takeru. I'd sworn then that I'd protect him from such pain again, but now reality was slamming in my face the painful fact of my failure.
I wanted to help him. I wanted to take that suffering away from him. I wanted to see him smiling and happy; I never wanted to see him like this again.
I gave him a brave, confident smile. "Yes," I said softly. "I will help you. You're not going to be alone in this anymore."
finis
Author's Notes: oh yay. This is so OOC and such shit. I don't really care anymore; I'm pretty much out of the Digimon fandom. All that's left now is to finish the fics I had intended to finish. I still love Digimon, but I doubt I will be starting anything new XD;