The rest of the day was kind of a slow blur.
We didn't talk after I cried on his shoulder. The training ground had turned quiet, the soldiers going back to their usual routines and pretending like they hadn't witnessed the whole thing. The wind was gentle with the field, bringing along sand and silence.
It was Kento who finally decided to move away from me.
He did it calmly. Without humor. Words he didn't have.
"Sorry," I muttered, taking a quick look at my face and hiding my weakness among the people.
He didn't only shake the head, but also the whole body. "Not at all."
His glance was not at all the fun kind now. They were quiet… empathetic.
"You're not expected to be strong with me," he added in a low tone. "You have been carrying far more than your share already."
I was nodding without an iota of doubt that I was here with him.
For quite some time, we didn't move stirringly and observed the empty space where swords had clashed, and voices had strengthened. Now it was the neighborhood of the dead of sounds - an eerie silence pervaded the place.
"I won't force you to talk," Kento said, looking ahead. "But… if you ever feel like breaking again, don't doing it by yourself."
I looked at him briefly.
After that, I really saw Kento's facial features.
The shape of the nose.
The pointed sharpness of the eyes when he wasn't grinning.
Thetering of the eyebrows getting a bit closer when he was overthinking - the usual way by which Kento.
Akira had the same habit.
My heart got strangled.
I shouldn't have spoken my mind, I said softly.
Kento breathed out slowly. "You did say the things that are right."
That stunned me.
"If I stop," he went on, "it makes me laugh because then everything—memory comes, the what-ifs, the silence—catches up with me." Turning to me at last, he said, "But, you know, I really don't pretend I don't miss him."
He tightened his jaw.
"He was the one I looked up to," he said simply.
Completely, something inside me melted.
I know that," I whispered.
We left the place together—neither too close, nor too far—just enough to keep each other company. As we passed, soldiers offered the salute to him. He did it properly, seriously. No fun. No theatrics.
He halted before leaving.
"I will be training earlier than usual tomorrow," he said.
Without thinking, I raised my eyebrow.
"Not to trouble you," he was very quick to add. "Just… if you happen to want someone quiet next to you."
I was in two minds.
After that, he nodded to me.
He didn't share his happiness with the world — just a small, real smile, was the only thing that showed on his face.
While lying on the bed and looking at the ceiling, a letter from Akira was by my side. The pain was still aching. The pain was still there, as heavy and sharp as ever.
But now… it wasn't only mine.
It was the first time after losing him that I felt that someone else knew how not to run from the pain but to walk with it.
And I felt Akira's presence somewhere deep inside me again.
Not as a hurt,
But as a helper.