[fic] Just Don't Look Back, Chapter 24 - Yugioh, YamixYugi, angst/romance, R, AU
Title: Just Don't Look Back
Chapter: 24
Author: Chey (duelist_gurl163)
Rating: R
Genre: Angst/romance
Pairing: YamixYugi
Archive: Here
Overall warnings: AU, implied sex, insanity, violence
Spoilers: None.
Summary: Before he met Yugi, Yami spent his days panhandling alone. Yugi put his heart into changing Yami’s life, giving him companionship, a home and his love. But even he can’t save Yami from the control of his past, nor the dark path he is set upon.
Disclaimer: Yugioh continues to not belong to me.
- 01 - 02 - 03 - 04 - 05 - 06 - 07 - 08 - 09 - 10 - 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - 16 - 17 - 18 - 19 - 20 - 21 - 22 - 23 -
---
A sparse room with minty-green walls greeted Yami when he opened his eyes. His first assumption was that he must be in a hospital. There was a definite anti-bacterial scent in the air. Slowly, he sat up, expecting pain. To his shock, he didn’t feel anything. Cautiously, he felt his abdomen and then pulled up his shirt, (he didn’t recognize his clothes; they must be from the hospital, for they were the same minty-green color), but there was no sign of bandages or injury.
How long have I been out?
He’d been hit by a car and judging by how much it had hurt, it had to have been bad. Was it possible he’d been in a coma, and had already healed? But surely there would be a scar…
Baffled, he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and pondered the nearly empty room, (too empty, really, for a hospital room), but found no answers there. There was a single window on one wall that seemed to look out on a hallway. The window was a relief for some of his nervousness - the room was awfully small.
Only then did he realize how quiet it was. Blissfully quiet. No voices, no memories, nothing but the sound of his own breathing and the bed squeaking. And for that matter, he didn’t feel dizzy or sick to his stomach, either. He felt…
Really, he felt quite normal.
Getting up, (and marveling at how he didn’t have to wobble and get his bearings), he walked over to the door and reached for the handle. He could flag down a nurse who would tell him what was going on. Or at least tell him the date.
His cheeriness faded as he tugged at the handle. It wouldn’t open. Nervousness setting back in, he yanked harder, then tried throwing his weight against it. It still refused t budge.
Why would they lock me in?
He moved to the window and peered out. “Hello?” he said loudly, knocking on the glass. It was unusually thick for window glass. Maybe he couldn’t be heard through it. He raised his voice. “Hello! Can anyone hear me? There’s some mistake, I’ve been locked in…hello?” He pounded his fist against it a few times, more frantically now. “Anyone, please, I don’t like this, could someone tell me what’s going on?”
He saw a flash of movement at the end of the hall and saw a stout, middle-aged woman walking toward him. She didn’t look much like a nurse, but she was wearing a uniform of a sort and at least she was proof that he wasn’t all alone in this building. In relief, he waved through the window and tried to smile. She smiled back and approached the door. He stepped away from the window, feeling much calmer. Finally, someone who could answer his questions.
He heard the door click open, and the woman bustled inside, all smiles. “It’s so lovely to see you up! And how are we feeling today?”
“Er…good, I guess,” Yami said, slightly taken-aback.
“Oh, that’s wonderful! Now, just a few quick questions before I bring you your lunch. What is your name?”
She had to be joking. “Well, Yami Atemu, the last time I checked,” he said. “Can I ask you-”
“And the date?”
Yami shrugged. “Early June, 2010. I don’t know the exact day. Now where-”
“That’s understandable. And do you know where you are?”
“No,” Yami said impatiently. “That’s what I’m trying to ask you. I just woke up here. Why are you asking me all these things?”
Her smile, (which, he now noticed, was beginning to look patronizing), never wavered as she said, “We’ve started you on a new medication. I need to make sure that it isn’t interfering with your cogency. It seems to have taken quite well.”
“Medication?” he repeated.
“We will give you several more tests, but if you continue to perform at this high of a level we may only need to keep you for a few more weeks of observation, and then you can move to a halfway house. I’m sure you’ll find it wonderful to be out and about.”
“What the hell?” Yami demanded. “What about the car crash? Where is Yugi?”
“What car crash?” she asked, playing along, though her perky demeanor faded just slightly.
“The accident! I stepped off the sidewalk and got hit by a car. I heard Yugi’s voice before it happened and looked up and there was a car coming at me and it hit. Then I woke up here. Is this a hospital? Why don’t I have any scars or injuries? If it’s still June, then I haven’t been out nearly long enough for them to have faded.”
“Oh, that was probably a dream,” she said, still smiling. “Medications do tend to give people very vivid dreams.”
“What are you saying? It wasn’t a dream. If it was, then why am I in the hospital? This is a hospital, right?”
“Yes, this is the Nagano Prefecture Psychiatric Hospital. Your mother, bless her, brought you here last August when you began to endanger yourself. She’ll be very happy to know that you’ve taken to the new treatment so well.”
Yami stared at her. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Excuse me?” More of her bubbliness faded away.
“You’re saying I’ve been here for nearly a year,” he said. “That isn’t possible. I met Yugi on September first and I’ve lived with him since October up until a few months ago. And before that I was homeless. There’s no way I was here, not if it’s still June.”
She shook her head, smoothing her uniform. “No, no, I’m afraid you’re mistaken. You have certainly been here since last year; I was here when you were brought in. You were very sick. It was a difficult case, after every medication you would relapse. We’ve finally tried a brand-new drug on the market, which you seem to have taken to. Your mother has been so worried, maybe we can call her later and have her come visit, would that be nice?”
“No,” he said flatly. “What would be nice is if you would tell me how I’ve been here, and at Yugi’s, at the same time.”
“I don’t know who Yugi is, dear. Maybe he’s an old friend? Or you might have made him up in your dream.”
“I didn’t make him up, he was real! And the car crash was real, too!”
“We tried some very strong medications, it’s very likely that you hallucinated or just imagined these things. It’s normal, it happens to everyone. What’s important is that you’re doing much better now. Would you like me to bring you some lun-”
“Yugi wasn’t a hallucination,” Yami snarled. “He was real. Here-” He pulled up his left sleeve, saying, “I have a scar, from when Ezui was harassing us, and I fought him, see-?”
His fingers brushed his arm where the scar should be, but felt nothing. Confused, he twisted around, trying to get a good look at his arm. The skin was unmarked; there was no sign of the old glass scar.
“I don’t understand,” he muttered, rubbing at his skin. “It was right here, it didn’t just fade, that isn’t possible.”
The nurse reached out to take his arm and tried to guide him toward the bed to sit down. “It’s okay, don’t worry. I told you the dreams are very vivid, you aren’t the first person to believe they were real-”
Yami jerked away. “But Yugi- my job, my room, Ezui, jail, the fight, the car crash…all of those things cannot just be hallucinations! Yugi was not a hallucination! He was too...too great, too perfect, to have been just a dream. It isn’t possible- I love him, he was not some goddamned hallucination!”
Looking alarmed now, the woman backpedaled and said, “Please calm down, it’s all right.” Yami glared at her and saw her reach for a small device clipped to her clothing. Moments later two large orderlies burst through the doorway. Before Yami could take in what was happening, they had grabbed him and forced him down on the cot. He fought back, struggling to get away, but he felt restraints being buckled over his legs. Panic set in.
“Stop it! Let go!” He thrashed, hoping to break their hold. “Stop!”
They were too strong. He stopped fighting for a moment, feeling an overwhelming sense of loss. Was it all just a dream? Had there been no boy named Yugi, no long afternoons laughing and talking, no first kiss, no anything…? Was he simply insane?
How could he be an illusion? Everything that happened, everything we shared, how could all of that not exist?
He’d believed in those moments, in those memories…
If being insane means Yugi exists to me…I don’t want to get better. I’d rather just stay insane.
Yugi, real or not, had made him smile. Yugi had brought him happiness.
I love him.
And then he realized that these people were the ones making him normal. They’d taken away his world with Yugi. If he just escaped from here, maybe Yugi would come back. With renewed strength he lashed out, trying to escape his bonds.
Suddenly, pain bolted through his body. He went rigid, crying out.
“Stop, that hurts! What are you doing? Stop it…it hurts, damn it, stop…it really hurts!”
“I want haloperidol, now,” he heard a voice ordering.
“He’s already torn those sutures-”
“I’m more concerned about the chest tube, we’ll take care of the sutures in a moment- is the IV back in?”
His head reeling, feeling almost sick with pain, he closed his eyes. He re-opened them to see a vague flurry of motion. A sleepy, liquid calmness was coming over him. He stopped fighting. His limbs felt heavy.
“What…” he tried to ask the blurry people around him. “What…is happening to me?”
They didn’t answer. His eyes slid shut. His thoughts faded away. The world vanished again.
- - -
When he opened his eyes the next time, he was in an entirely different place.
The room was still small, but these walls were white and this room, unlike the last, was cluttered with machines. He tried to sit up, made it a few centimeters, and was forced back down a second later from a sudden ache across his midriff. A rig beside the bed jangled and he looked to his left to see an IV hooked in his arm. Another clip was hooked to his finger, and yet another apparatus rested on his chest, leading to tubes in his nose. Another tube, that he couldn’t quite see, seemed to be coming out of his body on his right side, right under his arm.
This had to be a hospital. But was he someplace else entirely, or just in a medical wing of the other place?
Moving his head didn’t seem to invite any pain, so he slowly glanced from one side of the room to the other, looking for clues. A buzzer rested on a desk close by his right hand. Slowly, he inched his hand closer to it, pressed and held it down until footsteps outside told him someone was coming. A young man in nurse’s scrubs came in and smiled at him.
“How are you feeling?”
“Shitty,” Yami managed to spit, having no patience for more friendly, overly-cheery people. “Where am I? Is this the mental hospital?”
“No, this is Nagano Municipal Hospital.” He studied the monitors beside the bed, apparently pleased by what he saw. “You were brought here yesterday evening. You’ve already been into surgery and your vital signs look good, I’ll have the doctor come in to give you all the details and a possible timetable for being transferred. Do you feel like you can drink something?”
Yami stared at him a moment, then slowly reached across himself with his right hand, (wincing as he did) and gasped his arm. He could feel the scarred patch of skin from the glass wound, right where it should be.
So that was just a dream, he thought with relief. I was never in the mental hospital, and Yugi is real. Everything was real.
“Yes,” he finally said. “I think I would like a drink.”
The nurse nodded. “Okay, I’ll be right back.”
Yami relaxed and closed his eyes. He still felt somewhat sleepy. He expected to be in more pain that this, and assumed they must have him on drugs. It was fine, certainly preferable to the agony he’d been in before. He would be all right, especially now with his mind at ease. Yugi was real.
Then his thoughts, which had been almost euphoric for a moment, suddenly turned dark.
Not that it matters, I guess.
He knew Yugi couldn’t have really been there when he got hit. It was just a memory of the time Yugi had called out to him when Ezui was about to stab him. His instincts had probably sensed he was in danger, but he was so messed up and confused that the only way to warn him had been by using a memory. Yugi was actually far away, and they were broken up. It didn’t make a difference if he was real or not.
He wondered if the hospital had called his mother. He wondered if she would tell Yugi. No, he figured, she probably wouldn’t. She’d made it clear that she didn’t think he and Yugi’s lives should be intertwined anymore either.
The nurse returned with a small glass of juice, allowing him to take small sips. A half hour later the doctor, a very studious-looking woman, entered and introduced herself as Dr. Hayashi.
“Feel free to ask me any questions you have,” she said as she glanced at his chart.
“Okay. What happened after the accident? How bad am I hurt?”
“You were brought in with internal bleeding, fractured ribs, and a collapsed lung. There was concern of a concussion, but you seem to have escaped that. We have a chest tube already in place to stabilize your lung, that is the tube on the right. You tore some sutures early this morning, but they were quickly fixed. We will have to keep you here for a few weeks, but if your signs remain stable you will probably be out of the ICU in a day or so.”
Yami considered this, as well as the fact that they probably wouldn’t keep him on whatever drugs were keeping him calm right now. “Then to a recovery room?”
“Yes.”
“How big are those?”
“It’s a large room. You’ll be sharing it with other people.” She met his eyes. “Why?”
“Because I’m claustrophobic. I panic in small rooms when I’m stressed out, and I’m feeling pretty stressed. Chances are it’s going to happen eventually.”
She smiled. “I’ll see about finding you a bed beside a window, would that help?”
“Thanks. I would appreciate that.”
She checked his injuries, blood pressure and other vitals, and jotted some notes on the chart. As she was about to leave, Yami thought of something else and said, “Wait, I have another question.”
“What’s that?”
“Have you called anyone? Does my mom know?”
“We identified your next-of-kin this morning. Your mother has been notified.”
“Okay. Thanks. Nobody else knows? I mean…has anyone called about me?”
“I’m not sure. The receptionist will have a nurse report any calls to you.”
“Oh. Okay.” Yami closed his eyes as the door closed, unsure if he felt relieved or disappointed. Yugi probably doesn’t even know. There's no reason he'd call.
A few days later he was moved to a recovery room, beside a window as promised. While recuperating his roommates tried to introduce themselves, but he couldn’t find it in himself to make friends. Eve had arrived the day after he woke up and when he wasn’t evading her questions about what had led to the accident, he spent his time with the curtains around his bed drawn, staring out at the street below, trying not to think too much about his situation. With sleep and proper nourishment, his thoughts were coherent again. With the coherency returned his ability to focus for long hours on things that left him feeling anxious and depressed.
He thought a lot about his dream, especially after a psychiatrist came to see him. The moment he identified himself, (Dr. Jiro, of the psychiatric and mental health ward) Yami steeled himself for the worst.
“Come to lock me up?”
“I have no intention of locking you up,” he had replied. “May I sit down?”
Yami gestured toward a chair. “Go ahead.”
“Thank you.” He sat, maintaining a friendly air. “I’ve been told you’re claustrophobic.”
“News travels fast.”
“You told a nurse it was because you were in the southern earthquake four years ago, is that right?”
Yami sighed. “Yes. You could probably make quite an interesting case study out of me.”
“Are any of your problems related to why you were standing in the street?”
“I guess, in a round-about way. I wasn’t there on purpose, if that’s what you’re asking. I didn’t realize I was in the street.” Yami appraised him. “Look, if you’re going to lock me up, just tell me.”
Dr. Jiro straightened up. “As I said, we have no intention of locking you up, not unless you give us a reason, and we don’t have one. I am just here as a visitor.”
“Oh. Heard there was a messed up person around and needed to get involved, huh?”
If the bitterness in Yami’s voice stung, Dr. Jiro didn’t show it. “I’m here if there is anything you would like to talk about, or would like help with.”
Yami shrugged. “I don’t think you’ve got all the answers I need. Not right now.”
“I understand. If that’s how you feel, I’ll let you return to your rest.” Dr. Jiro stood and handed him a card. “I’ve been told your residence is not near here. I have some colleagues closer to Domino. Feel free to call me if you’d like me to put you in touch with them. They are all good people and some of them have a great deal of experience with treating post-traumatic stress and its symptoms.”
Yami took the card. He had used his mother’s address for the hospital forms, and assumed that’s where he’d gotten the residence information. “Thanks.”
“I hope you have a speedy recovery. If you should decide that there is anything I may be able to help with, don’t hesitate to ask someone to send me a message. I may come by and visit again when I get a chance. It can be rather lonely in recovery if your family lives far away.”
“Okay.”
The doctor exited, leaving Yami feeling more mixed up than before. He set the card on the table beside the bed and closed his eyes.
So now the psych ward was showing an interest in him…he supposed he should have expected it eventually. Normal, healthy people didn’t just randomly stand in traffic. They also probably didn’t hear voices.
He knew he’d been getting steadily worse. Maybe it really was only a matter of time before his dream was what he was destined to become. It wasn’t a big leap from a visit from a psychiatrist to a locked room. Insane, drugged, kept restrained away from the world. It was rock bottom and he was starting to realize how close to it he was getting.
And he thought about how, when faced with the possibility of Yugi vanishing from his life - from the world - he was able to say the words he’d been afraid of for years without any flashbacks or pain. The words Yugi had always so desperately wanted to hear.
It doesn’t matter, he tried to tell himself. It doesn’t matter if that’s what I turn into. Yugi isn’t here anymore. He let me go.
The only sign of Yugi he had seen in months was that one memory, just before the accident. At the time he’d believed - or maybe just desperately hoped - that it really had been Yugi. He knew better now.
It had been a few days before he could bring himself to ask his mom if she’d told Yugi about the accident. Even when he asked the question he could feel his heart racing, unsure which answer he was more scared of.
She had shaken her head and asked, “No, do you want me to?”
For a moment, he almost said yes. But when he opened his mouth, the word “no” tumbled out first, and he couldn’t make himself take it back.
Still, he couldn’t help a fond, sad thought:
He really did want to help me. Even in my memories he’s still looking out for me. Always trying to help, always giving me second chances.
He gazed out the window. He’d figured out long ago that the universe didn’t care. It could move along with or without him and be just fine. It didn’t care if he survived, if he went insane, if he was happy. He’d told himself he would make his own life and not sit around waiting on the universe to help, but like or not, he had found himself doing that anyway, thinking time would fix everything.
Yugi had cared. Honest to goodness loved him for who he was, broken pieces and all. He’d been an idiot not to see it until it was too late.
I wonder what would have happened if the car had killed me.
He thought that Eve probably would tell Yugi if that happened. She would think that he deserved the right to say good-bye. But would Yugi mourn?
He would. Even if I hurt him, he cared about me, even at the end. He would be sad if I died. He would care, he always cared. I should have told him how important that was. Why didn’t I ever tell him?
If he had died, even if Yugi forgave him and was ever willing to speak to him again, he wouldn’t be there to speak to. Even if there was a chance that Yugi would take him back, or a chance that he could get better…he would never be able to take it if he was dead.
He yawned and closed his eyes.
That dream doesn’t have to be my fate, does it?
He’d thought that, before. Believed that the nightmares were the only fate he could have. The only fate he deserved. Ending up here, it just seemed like proof that he’d been right.
Don’t I have a chance now? I’m still alive. That’s something.
Second chances didn’t come around that often. The universe seemed to have tossed one his way, but it wouldn’t care what he did with it.
He could give in. It was easier. God, did he know it was easier. Settle down in a nice padded room with medicine to make the days fly by, or find another car to stand in front of and enjoy that blessed empty silence, maybe forever this time. In some ways, death wasn’t his worst option. Despite his mother’s concern, she wasn’t going to save him. Yugi couldn’t save him. Shoua was damning him. Running bought him some comfort in the form of familiar pain, pain he’d learned how to function with, but how long could that last? Especially when, ever since losing Yugi, even the familiar ache had a new, sharper edge to it.
The point of no return was close enough that he could reach out and feel it. There wasn’t much further he could fall; such a short distance couldn’t hurt much. The sooner he got there, the sooner he could finally rest.
It might not be better, it might not be honorable, but maybe there he could find at least a moment of peace. And the only cost…
Freedom. Life. All his mother’s effort. Yugi’s love and trust. Himself.
It would only cost him everything.
If giving in was a choice though, that meant there had to be an opposite path, and not just a theoretical one. The options had to be equally possible for them to count as “choices.”
It was late, and his head hurt, and his body and mind were tired. He pushed the thoughts away in favor of the comfort of a dreamless, drugged sleep.
But as he was falling asleep, he wondered, what is the cost of the opposite path?
- - -
“Grandpa? What are you doing?”
Sugoroku shifted uneasily behind the counter. “I’m working.”
Yugi frowned. “You’re supposed to be taking an afternoon nap, the doctor said so!”
“I’m not tired,” he said stubbornly. “And I have a store to run.”
His grandson marched over and took his arm, pulling him upright. “You have to rest! You don’t want to have another heart attack, do you?”
“I’m sitting down!”
“I know you won’t just sit here and not move, you’ll insist on finding and carrying things for people. Go upstairs and relax and stop overexerting yourself! I’ll watch the store.”
Grumbling, his grandfather made his way back upstairs. Yugi took his place behind the counter with a sigh.
His grandfather hadn’t taken kindly to his new schedule of rest and relaxation. He’d been out of the hospital for months, he said, and there was no reason to continue to live this “old man” lifestyle. Every day Yugi found him trying to work when he was supposed to be taking his agreed-upon daily rest. And Yugi might have let it slide - knowing that there wasn’t a lot of stress in the game store business - but he had discovered that working was an excellent way to keep his mind busy and off other things. So he continued to encourage the afternoon rests.
A few moments later a mother and daughter came over to ask about getting a game out of one of the locked cases.
“Sure, which one did you want?” Yugi said, smiling and fetching the key. As he bent to unlock the case, he heard the store’s doorbell jingle and said, without looking up, “I’ll be with you in a moment.” He took out the video game that the daughter wanted, handed it to her, and locked the case. As he turned back toward the counter, he caught sight of the person who had walked in and stopped in his tracks. They met eyes. His heart began to pound.
“Yami?”
X - X - X
Notes: Happy Columbus Day, Canadian Thanksgiving, and National Coming Out Day. =3
In the US the basic test for cogency is name, date, and location…I’m not sure what they would ask in Japan so I went with what I knew. I’ll fully acknowledge that may all be wildly inaccurate, but…it was a dream so…loophole? xD
I’m concerned the ending is rather cliché…but I’m kind of fond of it. ^^; I’m a sucker for those ending-a-chapter-with-a-major-confrontation-about-to-happen tropes. Stick one in a book and you’re guaranteed to get me to keep reading.
Oh Yami. That boy sure can angst. ^^;
Chapter: 24
Author: Chey (duelist_gurl163)
Rating: R
Genre: Angst/romance
Pairing: YamixYugi
Archive: Here
Overall warnings: AU, implied sex, insanity, violence
Spoilers: None.
Summary: Before he met Yugi, Yami spent his days panhandling alone. Yugi put his heart into changing Yami’s life, giving him companionship, a home and his love. But even he can’t save Yami from the control of his past, nor the dark path he is set upon.
Disclaimer: Yugioh continues to not belong to me.
- 01 - 02 - 03 - 04 - 05 - 06 - 07 - 08 - 09 - 10 - 11 - 12 - 13 - 14 - 15 - 16 - 17 - 18 - 19 - 20 - 21 - 22 - 23 -
---
A sparse room with minty-green walls greeted Yami when he opened his eyes. His first assumption was that he must be in a hospital. There was a definite anti-bacterial scent in the air. Slowly, he sat up, expecting pain. To his shock, he didn’t feel anything. Cautiously, he felt his abdomen and then pulled up his shirt, (he didn’t recognize his clothes; they must be from the hospital, for they were the same minty-green color), but there was no sign of bandages or injury.
How long have I been out?
He’d been hit by a car and judging by how much it had hurt, it had to have been bad. Was it possible he’d been in a coma, and had already healed? But surely there would be a scar…
Baffled, he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and pondered the nearly empty room, (too empty, really, for a hospital room), but found no answers there. There was a single window on one wall that seemed to look out on a hallway. The window was a relief for some of his nervousness - the room was awfully small.
Only then did he realize how quiet it was. Blissfully quiet. No voices, no memories, nothing but the sound of his own breathing and the bed squeaking. And for that matter, he didn’t feel dizzy or sick to his stomach, either. He felt…
Really, he felt quite normal.
Getting up, (and marveling at how he didn’t have to wobble and get his bearings), he walked over to the door and reached for the handle. He could flag down a nurse who would tell him what was going on. Or at least tell him the date.
His cheeriness faded as he tugged at the handle. It wouldn’t open. Nervousness setting back in, he yanked harder, then tried throwing his weight against it. It still refused t budge.
Why would they lock me in?
He moved to the window and peered out. “Hello?” he said loudly, knocking on the glass. It was unusually thick for window glass. Maybe he couldn’t be heard through it. He raised his voice. “Hello! Can anyone hear me? There’s some mistake, I’ve been locked in…hello?” He pounded his fist against it a few times, more frantically now. “Anyone, please, I don’t like this, could someone tell me what’s going on?”
He saw a flash of movement at the end of the hall and saw a stout, middle-aged woman walking toward him. She didn’t look much like a nurse, but she was wearing a uniform of a sort and at least she was proof that he wasn’t all alone in this building. In relief, he waved through the window and tried to smile. She smiled back and approached the door. He stepped away from the window, feeling much calmer. Finally, someone who could answer his questions.
He heard the door click open, and the woman bustled inside, all smiles. “It’s so lovely to see you up! And how are we feeling today?”
“Er…good, I guess,” Yami said, slightly taken-aback.
“Oh, that’s wonderful! Now, just a few quick questions before I bring you your lunch. What is your name?”
She had to be joking. “Well, Yami Atemu, the last time I checked,” he said. “Can I ask you-”
“And the date?”
Yami shrugged. “Early June, 2010. I don’t know the exact day. Now where-”
“That’s understandable. And do you know where you are?”
“No,” Yami said impatiently. “That’s what I’m trying to ask you. I just woke up here. Why are you asking me all these things?”
Her smile, (which, he now noticed, was beginning to look patronizing), never wavered as she said, “We’ve started you on a new medication. I need to make sure that it isn’t interfering with your cogency. It seems to have taken quite well.”
“Medication?” he repeated.
“We will give you several more tests, but if you continue to perform at this high of a level we may only need to keep you for a few more weeks of observation, and then you can move to a halfway house. I’m sure you’ll find it wonderful to be out and about.”
“What the hell?” Yami demanded. “What about the car crash? Where is Yugi?”
“What car crash?” she asked, playing along, though her perky demeanor faded just slightly.
“The accident! I stepped off the sidewalk and got hit by a car. I heard Yugi’s voice before it happened and looked up and there was a car coming at me and it hit. Then I woke up here. Is this a hospital? Why don’t I have any scars or injuries? If it’s still June, then I haven’t been out nearly long enough for them to have faded.”
“Oh, that was probably a dream,” she said, still smiling. “Medications do tend to give people very vivid dreams.”
“What are you saying? It wasn’t a dream. If it was, then why am I in the hospital? This is a hospital, right?”
“Yes, this is the Nagano Prefecture Psychiatric Hospital. Your mother, bless her, brought you here last August when you began to endanger yourself. She’ll be very happy to know that you’ve taken to the new treatment so well.”
Yami stared at her. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Excuse me?” More of her bubbliness faded away.
“You’re saying I’ve been here for nearly a year,” he said. “That isn’t possible. I met Yugi on September first and I’ve lived with him since October up until a few months ago. And before that I was homeless. There’s no way I was here, not if it’s still June.”
She shook her head, smoothing her uniform. “No, no, I’m afraid you’re mistaken. You have certainly been here since last year; I was here when you were brought in. You were very sick. It was a difficult case, after every medication you would relapse. We’ve finally tried a brand-new drug on the market, which you seem to have taken to. Your mother has been so worried, maybe we can call her later and have her come visit, would that be nice?”
“No,” he said flatly. “What would be nice is if you would tell me how I’ve been here, and at Yugi’s, at the same time.”
“I don’t know who Yugi is, dear. Maybe he’s an old friend? Or you might have made him up in your dream.”
“I didn’t make him up, he was real! And the car crash was real, too!”
“We tried some very strong medications, it’s very likely that you hallucinated or just imagined these things. It’s normal, it happens to everyone. What’s important is that you’re doing much better now. Would you like me to bring you some lun-”
“Yugi wasn’t a hallucination,” Yami snarled. “He was real. Here-” He pulled up his left sleeve, saying, “I have a scar, from when Ezui was harassing us, and I fought him, see-?”
His fingers brushed his arm where the scar should be, but felt nothing. Confused, he twisted around, trying to get a good look at his arm. The skin was unmarked; there was no sign of the old glass scar.
“I don’t understand,” he muttered, rubbing at his skin. “It was right here, it didn’t just fade, that isn’t possible.”
The nurse reached out to take his arm and tried to guide him toward the bed to sit down. “It’s okay, don’t worry. I told you the dreams are very vivid, you aren’t the first person to believe they were real-”
Yami jerked away. “But Yugi- my job, my room, Ezui, jail, the fight, the car crash…all of those things cannot just be hallucinations! Yugi was not a hallucination! He was too...too great, too perfect, to have been just a dream. It isn’t possible- I love him, he was not some goddamned hallucination!”
Looking alarmed now, the woman backpedaled and said, “Please calm down, it’s all right.” Yami glared at her and saw her reach for a small device clipped to her clothing. Moments later two large orderlies burst through the doorway. Before Yami could take in what was happening, they had grabbed him and forced him down on the cot. He fought back, struggling to get away, but he felt restraints being buckled over his legs. Panic set in.
“Stop it! Let go!” He thrashed, hoping to break their hold. “Stop!”
They were too strong. He stopped fighting for a moment, feeling an overwhelming sense of loss. Was it all just a dream? Had there been no boy named Yugi, no long afternoons laughing and talking, no first kiss, no anything…? Was he simply insane?
How could he be an illusion? Everything that happened, everything we shared, how could all of that not exist?
He’d believed in those moments, in those memories…
If being insane means Yugi exists to me…I don’t want to get better. I’d rather just stay insane.
Yugi, real or not, had made him smile. Yugi had brought him happiness.
I love him.
And then he realized that these people were the ones making him normal. They’d taken away his world with Yugi. If he just escaped from here, maybe Yugi would come back. With renewed strength he lashed out, trying to escape his bonds.
Suddenly, pain bolted through his body. He went rigid, crying out.
“Stop, that hurts! What are you doing? Stop it…it hurts, damn it, stop…it really hurts!”
“I want haloperidol, now,” he heard a voice ordering.
“He’s already torn those sutures-”
“I’m more concerned about the chest tube, we’ll take care of the sutures in a moment- is the IV back in?”
His head reeling, feeling almost sick with pain, he closed his eyes. He re-opened them to see a vague flurry of motion. A sleepy, liquid calmness was coming over him. He stopped fighting. His limbs felt heavy.
“What…” he tried to ask the blurry people around him. “What…is happening to me?”
They didn’t answer. His eyes slid shut. His thoughts faded away. The world vanished again.
- - -
When he opened his eyes the next time, he was in an entirely different place.
The room was still small, but these walls were white and this room, unlike the last, was cluttered with machines. He tried to sit up, made it a few centimeters, and was forced back down a second later from a sudden ache across his midriff. A rig beside the bed jangled and he looked to his left to see an IV hooked in his arm. Another clip was hooked to his finger, and yet another apparatus rested on his chest, leading to tubes in his nose. Another tube, that he couldn’t quite see, seemed to be coming out of his body on his right side, right under his arm.
This had to be a hospital. But was he someplace else entirely, or just in a medical wing of the other place?
Moving his head didn’t seem to invite any pain, so he slowly glanced from one side of the room to the other, looking for clues. A buzzer rested on a desk close by his right hand. Slowly, he inched his hand closer to it, pressed and held it down until footsteps outside told him someone was coming. A young man in nurse’s scrubs came in and smiled at him.
“How are you feeling?”
“Shitty,” Yami managed to spit, having no patience for more friendly, overly-cheery people. “Where am I? Is this the mental hospital?”
“No, this is Nagano Municipal Hospital.” He studied the monitors beside the bed, apparently pleased by what he saw. “You were brought here yesterday evening. You’ve already been into surgery and your vital signs look good, I’ll have the doctor come in to give you all the details and a possible timetable for being transferred. Do you feel like you can drink something?”
Yami stared at him a moment, then slowly reached across himself with his right hand, (wincing as he did) and gasped his arm. He could feel the scarred patch of skin from the glass wound, right where it should be.
So that was just a dream, he thought with relief. I was never in the mental hospital, and Yugi is real. Everything was real.
“Yes,” he finally said. “I think I would like a drink.”
The nurse nodded. “Okay, I’ll be right back.”
Yami relaxed and closed his eyes. He still felt somewhat sleepy. He expected to be in more pain that this, and assumed they must have him on drugs. It was fine, certainly preferable to the agony he’d been in before. He would be all right, especially now with his mind at ease. Yugi was real.
Then his thoughts, which had been almost euphoric for a moment, suddenly turned dark.
Not that it matters, I guess.
He knew Yugi couldn’t have really been there when he got hit. It was just a memory of the time Yugi had called out to him when Ezui was about to stab him. His instincts had probably sensed he was in danger, but he was so messed up and confused that the only way to warn him had been by using a memory. Yugi was actually far away, and they were broken up. It didn’t make a difference if he was real or not.
He wondered if the hospital had called his mother. He wondered if she would tell Yugi. No, he figured, she probably wouldn’t. She’d made it clear that she didn’t think he and Yugi’s lives should be intertwined anymore either.
The nurse returned with a small glass of juice, allowing him to take small sips. A half hour later the doctor, a very studious-looking woman, entered and introduced herself as Dr. Hayashi.
“Feel free to ask me any questions you have,” she said as she glanced at his chart.
“Okay. What happened after the accident? How bad am I hurt?”
“You were brought in with internal bleeding, fractured ribs, and a collapsed lung. There was concern of a concussion, but you seem to have escaped that. We have a chest tube already in place to stabilize your lung, that is the tube on the right. You tore some sutures early this morning, but they were quickly fixed. We will have to keep you here for a few weeks, but if your signs remain stable you will probably be out of the ICU in a day or so.”
Yami considered this, as well as the fact that they probably wouldn’t keep him on whatever drugs were keeping him calm right now. “Then to a recovery room?”
“Yes.”
“How big are those?”
“It’s a large room. You’ll be sharing it with other people.” She met his eyes. “Why?”
“Because I’m claustrophobic. I panic in small rooms when I’m stressed out, and I’m feeling pretty stressed. Chances are it’s going to happen eventually.”
She smiled. “I’ll see about finding you a bed beside a window, would that help?”
“Thanks. I would appreciate that.”
She checked his injuries, blood pressure and other vitals, and jotted some notes on the chart. As she was about to leave, Yami thought of something else and said, “Wait, I have another question.”
“What’s that?”
“Have you called anyone? Does my mom know?”
“We identified your next-of-kin this morning. Your mother has been notified.”
“Okay. Thanks. Nobody else knows? I mean…has anyone called about me?”
“I’m not sure. The receptionist will have a nurse report any calls to you.”
“Oh. Okay.” Yami closed his eyes as the door closed, unsure if he felt relieved or disappointed. Yugi probably doesn’t even know. There's no reason he'd call.
A few days later he was moved to a recovery room, beside a window as promised. While recuperating his roommates tried to introduce themselves, but he couldn’t find it in himself to make friends. Eve had arrived the day after he woke up and when he wasn’t evading her questions about what had led to the accident, he spent his time with the curtains around his bed drawn, staring out at the street below, trying not to think too much about his situation. With sleep and proper nourishment, his thoughts were coherent again. With the coherency returned his ability to focus for long hours on things that left him feeling anxious and depressed.
He thought a lot about his dream, especially after a psychiatrist came to see him. The moment he identified himself, (Dr. Jiro, of the psychiatric and mental health ward) Yami steeled himself for the worst.
“Come to lock me up?”
“I have no intention of locking you up,” he had replied. “May I sit down?”
Yami gestured toward a chair. “Go ahead.”
“Thank you.” He sat, maintaining a friendly air. “I’ve been told you’re claustrophobic.”
“News travels fast.”
“You told a nurse it was because you were in the southern earthquake four years ago, is that right?”
Yami sighed. “Yes. You could probably make quite an interesting case study out of me.”
“Are any of your problems related to why you were standing in the street?”
“I guess, in a round-about way. I wasn’t there on purpose, if that’s what you’re asking. I didn’t realize I was in the street.” Yami appraised him. “Look, if you’re going to lock me up, just tell me.”
Dr. Jiro straightened up. “As I said, we have no intention of locking you up, not unless you give us a reason, and we don’t have one. I am just here as a visitor.”
“Oh. Heard there was a messed up person around and needed to get involved, huh?”
If the bitterness in Yami’s voice stung, Dr. Jiro didn’t show it. “I’m here if there is anything you would like to talk about, or would like help with.”
Yami shrugged. “I don’t think you’ve got all the answers I need. Not right now.”
“I understand. If that’s how you feel, I’ll let you return to your rest.” Dr. Jiro stood and handed him a card. “I’ve been told your residence is not near here. I have some colleagues closer to Domino. Feel free to call me if you’d like me to put you in touch with them. They are all good people and some of them have a great deal of experience with treating post-traumatic stress and its symptoms.”
Yami took the card. He had used his mother’s address for the hospital forms, and assumed that’s where he’d gotten the residence information. “Thanks.”
“I hope you have a speedy recovery. If you should decide that there is anything I may be able to help with, don’t hesitate to ask someone to send me a message. I may come by and visit again when I get a chance. It can be rather lonely in recovery if your family lives far away.”
“Okay.”
The doctor exited, leaving Yami feeling more mixed up than before. He set the card on the table beside the bed and closed his eyes.
So now the psych ward was showing an interest in him…he supposed he should have expected it eventually. Normal, healthy people didn’t just randomly stand in traffic. They also probably didn’t hear voices.
He knew he’d been getting steadily worse. Maybe it really was only a matter of time before his dream was what he was destined to become. It wasn’t a big leap from a visit from a psychiatrist to a locked room. Insane, drugged, kept restrained away from the world. It was rock bottom and he was starting to realize how close to it he was getting.
And he thought about how, when faced with the possibility of Yugi vanishing from his life - from the world - he was able to say the words he’d been afraid of for years without any flashbacks or pain. The words Yugi had always so desperately wanted to hear.
It doesn’t matter, he tried to tell himself. It doesn’t matter if that’s what I turn into. Yugi isn’t here anymore. He let me go.
The only sign of Yugi he had seen in months was that one memory, just before the accident. At the time he’d believed - or maybe just desperately hoped - that it really had been Yugi. He knew better now.
It had been a few days before he could bring himself to ask his mom if she’d told Yugi about the accident. Even when he asked the question he could feel his heart racing, unsure which answer he was more scared of.
She had shaken her head and asked, “No, do you want me to?”
For a moment, he almost said yes. But when he opened his mouth, the word “no” tumbled out first, and he couldn’t make himself take it back.
Still, he couldn’t help a fond, sad thought:
He really did want to help me. Even in my memories he’s still looking out for me. Always trying to help, always giving me second chances.
He gazed out the window. He’d figured out long ago that the universe didn’t care. It could move along with or without him and be just fine. It didn’t care if he survived, if he went insane, if he was happy. He’d told himself he would make his own life and not sit around waiting on the universe to help, but like or not, he had found himself doing that anyway, thinking time would fix everything.
Yugi had cared. Honest to goodness loved him for who he was, broken pieces and all. He’d been an idiot not to see it until it was too late.
I wonder what would have happened if the car had killed me.
He thought that Eve probably would tell Yugi if that happened. She would think that he deserved the right to say good-bye. But would Yugi mourn?
He would. Even if I hurt him, he cared about me, even at the end. He would be sad if I died. He would care, he always cared. I should have told him how important that was. Why didn’t I ever tell him?
If he had died, even if Yugi forgave him and was ever willing to speak to him again, he wouldn’t be there to speak to. Even if there was a chance that Yugi would take him back, or a chance that he could get better…he would never be able to take it if he was dead.
He yawned and closed his eyes.
That dream doesn’t have to be my fate, does it?
He’d thought that, before. Believed that the nightmares were the only fate he could have. The only fate he deserved. Ending up here, it just seemed like proof that he’d been right.
Don’t I have a chance now? I’m still alive. That’s something.
Second chances didn’t come around that often. The universe seemed to have tossed one his way, but it wouldn’t care what he did with it.
He could give in. It was easier. God, did he know it was easier. Settle down in a nice padded room with medicine to make the days fly by, or find another car to stand in front of and enjoy that blessed empty silence, maybe forever this time. In some ways, death wasn’t his worst option. Despite his mother’s concern, she wasn’t going to save him. Yugi couldn’t save him. Shoua was damning him. Running bought him some comfort in the form of familiar pain, pain he’d learned how to function with, but how long could that last? Especially when, ever since losing Yugi, even the familiar ache had a new, sharper edge to it.
The point of no return was close enough that he could reach out and feel it. There wasn’t much further he could fall; such a short distance couldn’t hurt much. The sooner he got there, the sooner he could finally rest.
It might not be better, it might not be honorable, but maybe there he could find at least a moment of peace. And the only cost…
Freedom. Life. All his mother’s effort. Yugi’s love and trust. Himself.
It would only cost him everything.
If giving in was a choice though, that meant there had to be an opposite path, and not just a theoretical one. The options had to be equally possible for them to count as “choices.”
It was late, and his head hurt, and his body and mind were tired. He pushed the thoughts away in favor of the comfort of a dreamless, drugged sleep.
But as he was falling asleep, he wondered, what is the cost of the opposite path?
- - -
“Grandpa? What are you doing?”
Sugoroku shifted uneasily behind the counter. “I’m working.”
Yugi frowned. “You’re supposed to be taking an afternoon nap, the doctor said so!”
“I’m not tired,” he said stubbornly. “And I have a store to run.”
His grandson marched over and took his arm, pulling him upright. “You have to rest! You don’t want to have another heart attack, do you?”
“I’m sitting down!”
“I know you won’t just sit here and not move, you’ll insist on finding and carrying things for people. Go upstairs and relax and stop overexerting yourself! I’ll watch the store.”
Grumbling, his grandfather made his way back upstairs. Yugi took his place behind the counter with a sigh.
His grandfather hadn’t taken kindly to his new schedule of rest and relaxation. He’d been out of the hospital for months, he said, and there was no reason to continue to live this “old man” lifestyle. Every day Yugi found him trying to work when he was supposed to be taking his agreed-upon daily rest. And Yugi might have let it slide - knowing that there wasn’t a lot of stress in the game store business - but he had discovered that working was an excellent way to keep his mind busy and off other things. So he continued to encourage the afternoon rests.
A few moments later a mother and daughter came over to ask about getting a game out of one of the locked cases.
“Sure, which one did you want?” Yugi said, smiling and fetching the key. As he bent to unlock the case, he heard the store’s doorbell jingle and said, without looking up, “I’ll be with you in a moment.” He took out the video game that the daughter wanted, handed it to her, and locked the case. As he turned back toward the counter, he caught sight of the person who had walked in and stopped in his tracks. They met eyes. His heart began to pound.
“Yami?”
X - X - X
Notes: Happy Columbus Day, Canadian Thanksgiving, and National Coming Out Day. =3
In the US the basic test for cogency is name, date, and location…I’m not sure what they would ask in Japan so I went with what I knew. I’ll fully acknowledge that may all be wildly inaccurate, but…it was a dream so…loophole? xD
I’m concerned the ending is rather cliché…but I’m kind of fond of it. ^^; I’m a sucker for those ending-a-chapter-with-a-major-confrontation-about-to-happen tropes. Stick one in a book and you’re guaranteed to get me to keep reading.
Oh Yami. That boy sure can angst. ^^;