Work Text:
i.
you’re brought back with gasping, heaving breaths and the first thing you see, through blurry tear-filled eyes, is nagomi.
your voice cracks. “ma.”
nagomi has always been ma, or makua, or occasionally gomi. your mom has always been māmā. that's how it's always been.
she brushes the sopping wet hair out of your eyes, and the tears spill over without your permission.
you don't want to be here.
“it's going to be okay, keiki.”
you don't think it's ever going to be okay again.
“i’ve got you.”
in a moment like this, you're not sure if that's good or not.
ii.
“why’d you do it?”
it’s a misleading question, and you both know it. she didn’t do it really, the fans did, she did it because someone had to, she did it because if someone had to, it should’ve at least been someone who gave a damn.
you don’t expect her answer. “lehua asked me.”
“māmā asked–” you sputter, not ready to process. “you talk?”
“only about you, keiki.” then, quiet enough you’re not supposed to hear: “only ever about you.”
you don’t know what to say.
“i love you.” a tight smile. “so does she. simple as that.”
simple as that.
iii.
the deep navy blue-almost-black of your debt mixes in with the bright cherry red of the shelled one’s corpse and they pulse in your blood like oxygenation, one going in, one going out.
you're so angry these days it's all you can feel.
you redact three people by the third week in and chorby’s gotten two– it's a sick probably one-sided competition. the rage percolates underneath your skin for weeks until it finally boils over. you shell one of their teammates and chorby observes nagomi right back.
if this were a chessboard, you’d be the queens slaughtering the pawns.
iv.
it's a sickening crunch, the first time you see it up close. somehow, you managed to watch chorby's relentless attacks with detachment–(because it could be you, in another world it is you)–but nagomi, your ma? that's different.
eventually they come for you too.
by the time you hit the postseason the team has been decimated, really. nagomi looks worse than you've ever seen her. and then–
bottom of the second harrell vanishes. it takes you all a second to figure out why. top of the seventh, nagomi’s by you in the outfield. it comes–
you don't stop screaming.
v.
it feels weird to be home. if you can even call it that.
(you don't think you can, because home is anywhere but here/your mother’s yard if you really had to choose, but you haven't been in years/a place you don't know anymore.)
even if you've spent the last two decades in halifax, give or take a few years, the expectations weigh heavy on your shoulders– or maybe that's exactly why they do. you're never going to be the person you were before you died; you know this, everyone else does not.
you don't want to try to be.
vi.
jesús doesn’t know how to look at you anymore. you don't blame him. you don't know how to change it. you don't know if you want to.
the distance is better, with the ego getting heavier. that's something no one gets, the way the gold is starting to tint your vision and fill up your veins. the only person who did just turned up in miami, and she doesn't want to see you.
you haven't left the idol board, even when you died. she hasn't either, despite being shadowed this time and the last.
you're not even good anymore.
vii.
a reporter asks you if you feel guilty, the day after lance serotonin gets redacted.
if nothing else, your mother has trained you well; you know how to sidestep questions like that and what to say and when. so you give them sweet platitudes and empty nothings and text your mother afterwards.
you haven’t spoken since nagomi got redacted. she doesn’t know what to do with you–either of you, really–and you get it, you do. to be willing to die for your son is one thing, to deal with the baggage of their resurrection is entirely another.
she doesn’t text you back.
viii.
the moist talkers have won twice since you were last on them; once in your name, once in the face of your shame. you might still make it but–
a ring would be nice, sure, but you’d rather it be… (anytime but now/when you actually could have enjoyed it/before all of this/fuck, you were only a kid/you’re still just a kid/sometimes you think you’re still eight and in that shell/like you never really left it/maybe you haven’t)
you leave halifax without a ring, and you’re better for it. that’s what you tell yourself.
ix.
terrell picks you up from the airport, and it feels like the first taste of home you’ve felt since nagomi got redacted. for a second you really are eight again, even if you’re solidly up to his shoulder these days.
seattle is gray, and so fucking bleak. even halifax wasn’t this bad– despite the cold winds, you still got some damn sun. if you stay in the room terrell’s offered up long enough, you might not have to tell the difference.
that lasts five days. seattle, it seems, may be ready for you, but you aren’t ready for it.
x.
terrell drags you to meet the rest of the team–”you’ve gotta at least give ‘em a shot, kid,”–and ollie mueller socks you in the face as soon as you do. it confuses you until he mentions a liv and you remember the taste of infinity in your mouth.
(you must have watched that video of bright punching jess half a dozen times back then. the composure jess had in that moment– it’s still stuck in your mind. somehow, you don’t think you’re managing as well.)
“well, fuck you too,” you spit, and hit him right back.
xi.
you know you're about to do it right before it happens. it being redemption in the eyes of the league; it being signing bright zimmerman’s life sentence, once again.
(the revoke wasn't your idea, that was all the fans. but you certainly endorsed it; it was one of the last things you did. the funny thing is, you don't remember why.)
the bright in front of you is not the one you knew. she is tired and bitter and aching, and for a second you swell with regret. then, lotus hits a grand slam, and the cheers wash that regret away.
xii.
you’ll give the team this– they let you be.
maybe it’s the gold framing your irises, maybe it’s the crushing inevitability hanging over your head, but you’ll take the relative calm after the past couple years.
(no concerts or albums for you and you’re grateful for it. as is, you’re nearly sick from the promos of chorby still hanging around, but that’s theirs to bitter over, not yours.)
day 99 comes, and the gold finally fills your lungs entirely. the last thing you see, as the boxes descend, is nagomi, reaching for your hand.
at least you won’t be alone.