It's been close to a week since I took Asia with me to heaven, and let's just say that the poor girl did not take anything that was said there well. I expected to get chewed out by her, but no, she didn't lash out, she didn't scream, or even ask many questions, really. She just took it all in and became silent as a grave. That was not something I expected to happen.
Of course, I gave her plenty of space to process what had been said, but it was slow going, and the silence aimed my way was killing me inside, mostly because I just did not really think about how she would react at all. I did what felt right to me. Not that I actually regret what I did, no, of course not, but it did put a big divide between the two of us, and that divide was growing bigger day by day.
I honestly don't know what hit the girl harder, the fact that God was dead, or that I took control of heaven. But if I had to guess, it was the combination of those two things.
And you know what? During that week, Gabriel's words kept replaying themselves in my head over and over, and the worse my mood got, the more I understood what she meant.
It might have been pure chance that I found Asia, or maybe it was just like Gabriel said, God foresaw this and made it happen. That, of course, didn't change anything about how she managed to worm her way into my heart in such a short amount of time. Asia was mine. Sister, daughter, it did not matter what label I put on the feeling. I knew, deep down inside, that the girl was very important to me.
Then, exactly a week later, on a Sunday morning during breakfast, I just couldn't take her silence anymore. It was suffocating.
Then we fought, and it was not pretty, but I'll let you be the judge.
"Talk to me, Asia, please…" I looked up from my breakfast, and she saw my pleading eyes because she slumped slightly and sat down across from me.
"H–How, Takumi? How should I talk to you?"
"Like before. Nothing has changed, and you know it."
"But that is not true, is it? A–After what you did, things changed." She retorted.
"Did they really? Because from where I'm standing, nothing much has changed. You just know now. That's it, and you can't accept it." She took offense to that, obviously.
"Accept it? How can I? The reality I lived in for my whole life was a lie, and because of that lie, I was shunned. Then you told me about you, and what you truly are. How do you want me to react to that, Takumi?" She replied with some heat and tears on the verge of spilling out of her eyes.
"Not with silence, that's for sure. You had a week to come to terms with it, Asia, and let me repeat, nothing has changed. Not in your life." Because, despite everything she was saying to me right now, I still heard her praying at night. Only right now, she knew the person it was directed at.
"You don't understand!"
"What do you want me to understand?! You still pray every day, only now those prayers might actually come true. So what the fuck is your problem?"
"Why did you tell me?! You could have just kept it to yourself… but no, you just had to bring me into it." And there it was. The tears spilled over. Asia started crying. Not sad tears, though, no, there were angry ones.
"Oh! So I should have just lied to you. Perfect! fucking perfect, Asia. So you'd be less mad if you found that I hid this from you years later, yeah???" No words came out of her mouth, she just stared at me with a sad expression.
"No retort, huh? Of course, you have nothing to say because you know I'm right. I'm so fucking sorry your Sky Daddy was not up to snuff." I spat with venom and left the room before I had the chance to say something even worse. Because believe me, I had it in the chamber.
"You don't just get to leave this conversation, Takumi!" In a whirl of motion, Asia stood in front of me before I had the chance to storm off and take out my frustrations on some stretch of an uninhabited land.
And to say it surprised me would be an understatement. I did not think she had it in her.
She stood before me, eyes blazing. Not with fury or hurt, but with the very human need to be understood.
"You don't get to decide what I should feel, or how fast I should heal." She said, voice trembling, but firm. I just stood there, stunned. The silence that followed was suffocating.
"I don't get it. What healing? God was nothing but an abstract concept in your life until a week ago." I really did not understand her problem, though maybe that was my fault. I never believed in anything but myself, and now, after everything I've been through, my belief was more firm than ever.
"That's how you view it? But then again, given what you are, I guess it's only fitting…"
"You think that being a dragon god has anything to do with this? I was a fucking human five years ago! And no god fucking helped me when I starved on the streets and begged for goddamn food! Where were the angels then, Asia? Where was God? Fucking nowhere! I was twelve years old when I could not take the hunger anymore and robbed a store for the first time! I was only thirteen when I stabbed a guy to death when he tried to force himself on me! So I'm sorry that I don't understand your belief in something that has been dead for centuries! I'm so sorry that I did not lie to you to shelter your weak fucking mind from the truth. I'm so sorry that you can't face reality!" I was hyperventilating, whether from anger or bottled-up emotions, I don't know.
"Do you see this scar, Asia? The one on my neck? I died. I bled out in a dirty alleyway in Ikebukuro, and instead of hell, where I should be, I found myself in the dimensional gap, being told that I am the third Dragon God. You wanna know what I did when my reality shattered? I shrugged my shoulders, said fuck that, and soldiered on, because that is something you have to do, or you'll go mad!" I finished my piece and gently grabbed her shoulder, moving her aside.
"Let me leave before I say something I regret for the rest of my life." I pushed her slightly to the side, but the girl stubbornly dug her heels in and refused to move an inch. I have already shared way too much due to the heat of the moment, and I really did not want to get into the nitty-gritty of my not-so-glorious past, especially not with Asia. Because I knew that I was a petty enough bitch to turn this whole thing into a one-upping match, and I desperately wanted to avoid that.
"Takumi… ? P–Please don't run away…" She looked at me, her lips quivered, and her tears started pouring once more.
"Don't do this to me, Asia. Move aside, please. I should not have brought this up…" I pleaded with her because if I stayed, I would be crying along with her.
"I–I didn't know…. " She muttered in a half-whisper.
"Of course you didn't. The only person who knew is Red, and even then, I have not told him much. This is something that I just have to deal with myself."
"You should have told me. I would not have thought any less of you, Takumi." She said gently and placed her hand on my forearm.
"Maybe, but this is not about me. This is about you, Asia. Because I'm not the one struggling with my belief, or lack thereof, you are." I tried to drive my point home. I was not the one who needed to talk about anything. I was not struggling to wrap my brain around something. She was, even if, like me, she refused to acknowledge it.
"I am struggling, Takumi. I am struggling so much… I don't know what to do."