Kagai sits up, their room dark and dim. There is trash scattered everywhere and clothes are piled up on the floor. Kagai's eyes barely have a spark of life in them anymore, just a black pit of darkness with no stars afloat. Kagai struggles to grab their glasses from their messy nightstand, their hand reaching in the wrong spot. They eventually feel the familiar plastic rims of the glasses and the scratched lens on the right side. They slide the glasses on their face, blinking some. Their eyes finally focus and all they see is their ceiling, water damage stains visible on the off white surface. Yelling is heard outside the door, most likely their parents arguing. Kagai feels weak from just being here, being alive, living this life. The hope left in them is like a cosmic void, nothing, just vastness...Kagai can hear rain slapping against their window roughly, creating large streams of water that drip down the window. The screen on the window is busted and has just been left that way because what money do they have to replace it? Kagai always loved rainy weather for 3 different reasons. The calming sound, the way it covers the bright sun that always hurt their eyes, and they feel like the raindrops are like them. Kagai thinks of it like a sorrowful cry or scream for release, which is what they always feel. They want to cry, to scream, but it never comes out, it stays bottled up in their core, hidden away. Its not like they can express that raw emotion anyways. Their emotions are undiscovered territory for them. Ever since they were a kid, they have never cried or shown human emotion. Their face just stays straight and stone cold. There is a loud crash in the living room but Kagai could care less. They sit up in their bed, their messy hair covering their face like a silky black curtain. They step out of their bed, shoving some of the trash and dirty clothes to create a path to walk. Just this is exhausting, it makes their legs shake some but they manage to make it to their door, twisting the slightly rusted handle. They open the door and look out some, seeing their mom sitting on the couch, a slap mark on her cheek and a look of frustration on her face. The old floral lamp is on the floor, the worn bulb crushed. Kagai's mom looks over at them, her facial expression softening some. Kagai's expression stays cold, distant almost. "Just your dad again, had one of his outbursts..." their mom mutters. “Are you alright?” Kagai asked, the words falling flat, devoid of any genuine concern. Their mom rubs the bridge of her nose, a familiar gesture of stress. "Yeah, just a little frustrated." Kagai's face offers nothing, a porcelain surface with no cracks. There is a sudden silence that is a physical weight, pressing in on the room as Kagai stands there unmoving, their dark eyes locking on their mom. “Where is he?” Kagai asked, the sterile query as cold as their dark eyes. "Who? Oh... your father," their mom mumbles, seeming to gather her thoughts. "He stormed off in a huff. No idea where he went." Kagai's gaze is heavy-lidded, giving the illusion of annoyance, but it is just a blank stare. Kagai’s half-lidded eyes gives nothing away. "What was he mad about?" the words are flat, controlled. "He wanted beer," their mom starts, her voice catching. "I just... couldn't afford it." The explanation seems to cement Kagai's rigidity; their arms crossing, and their stiff posture remains unchanged. Kagai just looks at their mom, the silence before their words conveying the contempt. "I don't care." Kagai’s arms remain crossed, while their mom’s body language grows smaller, a slight jump followed by a pained expression. A look of understanding dawns on their mom's face, quickly being replaced by pain. "You didn't ask because you cared, did you?" Kagai’s look is damning. "What does it feel like, Jessica?" They don't even bother to hide their disdain. "Did you just call me Jessica?" their mom asks, a quiet accusation in her voice. "I am your mother, Kagai. Show me some respect." Kagai blinks, "Save your breath. You lost the right to that name long ago. You are nothing but an obstacle in my path." No heat, no life, no inflection—just a cold, hard statement of fact. Kagai turns their back on their mother, the conversation over, and heads out the front door in search of their father.

The world is a wash of gray, but Kagai’s stark figure remains unmoved, finding a solitary kinship in the cold downpour. A solitary figure against the downpour, Kagai walks down the stairs, the rain soaking their hair and creating a dark, liquid frame around their glasses. Kagai knows, with the cold certainty of long experience, that their father is close. The deluge plastered against the lenses of Kagai’s glasses, turning the world into a distorted watercolor. Kagai takes off their glasses, putting an end to the rain-blurred view, before stowing them away. With the glasses gone, their sight is reduced to a soft, chaotic painting, but their certainty in the route to the back of the house is absolute. Moving toward the back of the house, Kagai finds their father. He stands in the dry, shallow recess beneath the roof, the cherry-red tip of his cigarette glowing in the gloom. Their father's head snaps up, and the look in his eyes is one of pure annoyance. "What are you doing out here, kid?" he says, the gruffness of his voice mirroring the harshness of his stare. "None of your business," Kagai says, the words as lifeless as stones dropping into a well. He laughs, a sharp, humorless sound. "None of my business? When have you ever been anything but my business?" Their father's snapping is met with a flat, unwavering gaze. "I decide what is and is not your business now." He laughs, a short, sharp bark that cuts through the silence. "Your authority ends where the mortgage begins, Kagai. We'll be having this conversation again when you can pay the bills." Kagai stares through their father as if he were glass. "You decided to have a child. I simply happened to you." The father sighs, a show of theatrical pity. "And you will follow the rules, just like any child. Or have you forgotten what happens when you don't?" Kagai stares at their father, then at the brick wall of the house, as if the topic is utterly boring. "I haven't forgotten. You can do what you have to do." Their father smirks, "That's good," the father says, his voice level. "Because I will." Kagai shrugs, "My tolerance for it is high," Kagai says, stating it as an objective fact, not a complaint. He takes a final, deep drag, the cherry glowing bright before he lets the cigarette fall. He grinds it out with the heel of his shoe, a deliberate, grinding motion. Kagai watches as the ember fades, a thoughtless observation of an inevitable end. "I'll decide when this conversation is over," their father finally says, stepping toward the house. "And it's over." The water runs down Kagai's face in cold rivulets. They follow their father, every motion stiff and deliberate, an act of pure, unfeeling physics.

Once inside, the unspoken weight of the recent argument kept the parents apart. The only sounds were the soft closing of doors and the hum of the refrigerator. And at dinner the clink of silverware is the only sound at the table. At either end, the parents eat in silence. In the middle, Kagai watches them both, a quiet presence at the eye of the storm. Kagai pushes a piece of food around their plate, the scrape of the fork against the ceramic a small, persistent sound in the silence.

"Kagai," their mother says, her voice low and strained. "Are you going to eat?" Kagai simply places their fork down, its light clink the only sound. "No." The silence that settles over the table again is not peaceful, but brittle. It amplifies the smallest sounds: the slow, deliberate movement of cutlery, the soft clink of a glass. Kagai simply watches the two of them, their unblinking gaze a silent, unmoving presence in the middle. Once back in their room, Kagai writes in their journal: “𝑰𝒏 𝒔𝒐𝒎𝒆 𝒘𝒂𝒚𝒔, 𝒊𝒕 𝒘𝒂𝒔 𝒏𝒊𝒄𝒆 𝒕𝒐 𝒃𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒍𝒆𝒂𝒗𝒊𝒏𝒈, 𝒊𝒏𝒔𝒕𝒆𝒂𝒅 𝒐𝒇 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒐𝒏𝒆 𝒃𝒆𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒍𝒆𝒇𝒕.” They close their journal, placing it on the cluttered nightstand and they lay down, closing their eyes and letting the sleep take them.