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On June 18, 1989, Sayu Yagami is born. She is beautiful. She is glowing, warm, new. The Yagami household is alight with happiness. In the corner of the living room, Light Yagami sits with his puzzle and watches his mom coo sweet nothings into the infant’s ear. The Yagami household is alight with happiness, but Light is not. After all, he has to be a part of the family for that. But he isn’t. He has never been.
He looks at the tiny, tiny thing squirming in his mom’s arms and feels something in his chest. But he remembers thinking: maybe she’ll end up like me. Maybe she’ll understand me.
With the thought comes another wave of the same ugly emotion. He will never know if it was hope, disgust or fear. He doesn’t think he ever wants to.
When Sayu Yagami was 2 years and 4 months old, she fractured her arm.
She doesn’t remember it, of course, but from the stories exchanged at their dinner table between hysterical laughter and “Oh, Light, you were so clumsy back then!”, she gathers it went something like this: Light had been playing with her sitting on his bed while their parents were both in the living room when he accidentally dropped her on the floor. Her parents came running at the sound of her wailing only to find her sprawled on the floor, all twisted arms and full of agony.
It’s a horrifying memory, but it's shared during dinner with laughter, anyway. Her mom recalls how scared her brother had been; he wouldn't stop crying even after she came back home, all fixed up. He was terrified her baby sister was broken, she says. As Sayu watches her brother smile at his mom's exaggerated claims, telling her, ‘ Stop it, mom, that's embarrassing ’ she remembers something she read a while ago.
Babies don't form autobiographical memories until they are two. And even then, most of their vivid ones end up being something they made up in their head by associating them with vague emotions, pictures about the incident seen in later parts of their life or retelling of the story. That's why, she thinks, she remembers it like this:
Light, staring at her, eyes empty and bored. Light, holding her over the edge of the bed hearing her squeal with joy. Light and the tilt of his head, considering. Light, letting go. Red hot pain. Screaming, screaming, screaming.
He was so scared of breaking his baby sister, her mom says. But the lie her mind made up says that the day she came back home, the first flash of emotion in his eyes was not fear or sorrow. Her memory speaks to her, whispers in her ear, that it was something much, much worse.
Light of the present ducks his head and rubs the back of his neck, seemingly embarrassed. He doesn't meet her eyes. An image flashes behind her eyes, loud and clear.
It wasn't fear in his eyes that she remembered seeing; it was disappointment.
The spring she turned four, her brother tugged her to their garden, claiming that he had something to show her.
It went something like this, she thinks: sunlight, golden, kissing her skin. A hand in hers, the world small enough to fit in her palms. Garden full of green and blue and pink and life. Light had crouched on the grass and gestured her to follow, his lips stretched in a giddy grin.
And follow she does. Because when you are 4, your brother is your Polaris before you even learn what it is. He is your saviour, your hero, and your sweetest dream come true; he holds all the secrets of this universe in his chest and whispers them to you at night if you ask him to tell you a story. He doesn’t speak to you often, but that’s okay. You hoard every word of his in the corner of your ribs and your eyes shine brighter than the sun when you make him smile because you made him smile! You made Light light up!
In your head, the crowd goes wild. You feel like you can hold the world in your hand. And if it’s too heavy, your brother will take it from your palms anyway.
Where were we again? Ah, yes. She follows him and clamps her mouth shut with wide eyes when he shushes her with a smile, pointing at the flowers in front of them. She barely holds herself back from squealing when she sees what he’s pointing at.
Butterflies! She stares at them in awe and turns to Light, beaming, “Light, look! They are so pretty!”
Her brother only laughs softly in response, “Not too loud, Sayu. You’ll scare them away.”
She gasps and slaps her mouth closed again. She was trying to stay as still as she could, too! But she could only last for so long without speaking. She ends up sighing, “Their wings are so pretty! I wish I could stare at them forever.”
Light suddenly goes silent. It always made her feel a little weird when her brother looked like that; all thoughtful and serious. It felt like he was somewhere far, far away, somewhere she could never reach. Sometimes she wonders if one day, he will get lost in that faraway place. She wonders if she would be reaching out into the empty air forever. But she doesn’t think of it too long, of course.
When you are 4, thoughts are like sand spilling out of your palm. The sand doesn’t concern you, because you have better things to worry about. You’re too busy thinking about how you can make your mom give you another piece of candy or how Aya from school had better dresses than you. You don’t think of the sand on your palms, the endless void in your brother’s eyes or how bad it makes you feel. Why would you? You don’t even know what a void is. You are 4 and invincible and you love your brother so very much. That’s more than enough, isn’t it?
In a flash, Light had reached out and caught the butterfly by its wings. She shrieks, from joy or fear, she doesn’t know, “You caught it!”
Her brother gives her another patient smile before turning back to the insect in hand. The creature flutters wildly in his grasp and Sayu can only watch, mortified and fascinated at the same time. There is a certain beauty that comes with power, with iron fists and sharp teeth. There is something terrifying and so very ethereal about the ability to hold life in one’s palm and observe it not with wonder, but with a bored kind of interest. Watching with a barely concealed smirk like a predator playing with its prey before getting ready to strike. Power is a dirty cloak, a bloodied crown and her brother wore it like a king even when he was 8 and missing two of his front teeth.
“Do you like its wings, Sayu?” she nods wildly in response, “Alright, then.”
She recognizes the song he’s humming under his breath. It’s the lullaby their mom sings them every night but it sounds wrong, somehow. Upside down and haunting. It makes her sad. She’s still thinking about it when Light tears the butterfly’s wings off its back and squashes the insect beneath his feet. He doesn’t even look down as he does so. Her brother holds out the wings to her, still smiling.
Sayu Yagami is four years old when she first sees a life being taken. She screams.
She’s still screaming when her mom finds them. When Light looks at her, his eyes are filled with betrayal.
“Look what you did, Light,” her mom shakes her head disapprovingly, “You’ve made such a mess and now your sister is crying.”
The butterfly is still twitching on the ground. One doesn’t develop a proper concept of death when they are four but Sayu looks at the writhing, half-crushed creature on the ground and feels a sadness so vast that she drowns in it. Sometime in the future, she will find out that butterflies don’t feel pain as humans do. Their nervous system is too underdeveloped to do so. But when she is 4 years old, something in her cracks and wails, wrong wrong wrong , at the sight in front of her.
Light is still staring at her, lost.
“But you wanted to look at them forever. I gave you what you wanted,” he says numbly, “Why are you crying?”
(Her brother would give her the world if she asked. And for the first time, she realizes how terrifying that was.)
It didn’t take her long to stop crying; she had forgotten all about it in ten minutes. The butterfly is still dead but what does that matter? 4-year-olds have the blessing of not remembering the past and not wanting to think about the future. They live for the present, the warmth of a laugh, their favourite food, and another school day. Sayu is like that, too. She gets up faster than she falls apart. 10 minutes is enough for her to piece her world back together.
Her brother doesn’t speak to her for a month after that. Because sometimes, it takes less than a second for someone else’s world to break apart and never be the same again.
To Light Yagami, Soichiro’s words are the holy scripture.
Sayu’s brother hangs on to every word of their father like it's his lifeline; listens to his talks of justice and right and wrong with reverent eyes and bated breath. It’s almost uncanny how her brother moulds himself based on their dad’s ideal version of a good man- respects ladies and elders, studies studiously, works hard and aims to please. Soichiro Yagami talks and Light Yagami becomes.
But most of all, Light inherits their father’s sense of justice.
He holds on to their father’s strict morals and ideals close to his chest and hides them in the crook of his ribs. He unhinges his jaws, swallows the bitter truths and the image of the ideal world, and crushes them between his teeth before swallowing them whole. You are what you eat, they say, and her brother had always been hungry. Her brother always had a bottomless stomach and an endless appetite for more, more, more. And so, Soichiro Yagami talks and Light Yagami becomes .
In their household, when their father is in the room, the TV always plays the news. It’s an unspoken rule in the house and while Sayu initially whined about it, she slowly came to terms with it. After all, there are some things you can’t change no matter how you try.
The news drones on in the background when she and Light sit on the couch while their parents eat dinner behind them. Sayu is 6 when she sees the news flashing on the screen ‘Man robs the bank to get money for his wife’s cancer surgery, gets 10 years in prison’ . She turns to her brother when she hears him scoffing, “People like him shouldn’t be allowed to live.”
Sayu frowns, “Isn’t that too mean?”
Light shakes his head, scowling, “He’s a selfish man. If he needed money, he should’ve worked for it. Instead, he steals innocent people’s money for his own benefit. He doesn’t deserve to live.”
Sayu’s frown deepens. She wasn’t so sure about what her brother was saying; after all, the man was just trying to help his wife, no? He did a bad thing, but surely he didn’t deserve to die for it. Right?
“One day,” he announces, “I will change the world. The people who hurt innocent people will no longer be in it. I will build the perfect world.”
Sayu didn’t have any idea what a perfect world would look like. She didn’t know whether it was okay to kill bad people because they did bad things. But her brother said so and he was always right. So she beams and asks, “Would there be a lot of candy in your world?”
Light only smiles and flicks her forehead, making her yelp.
Soichiro Yagami talks and Light Yagami becomes. You are what you eat. And her brother eats and eats and eats and now, at eighteen, Sayu wonders if it’s because he doesn’t like what he already is. Because he wants to become something else, someone else. She wonders if he eats thinking , I am what I eat.
Her brother loves their mom’s tempura and tonkatsu.
Their mom is a good cook, but also one with a million and one concerns about the health of her children. She always tried her darndest not to make or give them any fried food. Sayu didn’t mind; as long as she was allowed to have her desserts now and then, she was satisfied.
When she was 7, they were all seated at the dining table during one of the rare days that she decided to indulge their wishes with her famous tonkatsu and tempura. Light, always the obedient son, helped his mom set up the table and sat down with his hands folded on his lap, but she could see in his eyes that he was excited about it.
Her brother eats like a man starving; he mutters empty prayers under his breath and digs into the meal like it’s his last one. He’s a growing boy, his mom says, and he has a healthy appetite.
But her brother doesn’t eat like a boy. Her brother eats like a dog, like a thief, like a sinner begging for alms at the altar. Desperate, afraid, and hungry. So, so hungry. He has a bottomless pit for a stomach and the teeth of a beast and his eyes are glazed over slits when he shovels the food down his throat. When their parents aren’t looking, he licks his fingers clean, down to every knuckle.
Sayu wonders how long it will be till her brother eats this world whole.
“Mom, can I please have some more?” Light asks, sweet and polite. Always an obedient child.
His mom smiles but shakes her head, “I'm sorry, Light. I didn't make much today. We only have enough for Sayu.”
At the sound of her name, she perks up. Her brother turns to her and gives her a sugary sweet smile. She can almost feel the stickiness of it between her fingers. He asks, “Sayu, can I please have your share?”
Sayu narrows her eyes. She hates it when her brother smiles like that. Her teeth ache. Too sweet.
“No,” She says, taking another bite of her rice, “I want to eat it.”
His smile falls for a fraction of a second before it comes back sweeter than before, “Please? I will give you whatever you ask for. Just give me some of your portion.”
She shrugs, chewing, “I don’wan anythin’.”
Their mother watches, eyebrows raised. She doesn't say anything.
His smile twitches, the first chink in his armor. He snakes an arm towards her plate, which she slaps away.
“I said no, Light,” she snaps, pulling her plate towards herself, “It's mine.”
A flash of fury in his eyes. At that moment, she realizes one thing: her brother doesn't eat like a dog, a thief, or a sinner. He eats like a king, with his eyes glazed over and delirious, with his gold-shackled hands taking and taking till all that remains are the bones of his dear subjects and the lingering scent of his want. Mine, mine, mine. He eats like God, with his all-knowing smile and his sharp teeth meant to kiss, meant to kill. He eats every crumb and licks his plate clean. His knuckles are still bloody from putting together humans and tearing them apart when he sees fit, too. The blood tastes sweet and oh, how he yearns for more. He sits on his throne with his chin on his fist, looking at the world in his palm. His to crush, his to create, his to destroy, his to eat. Mine, mine, mine .
When God isn't obeyed, when his words aren't considered holy scripture and the absolute truth, he does what he does better than creating.
He destroys.
Crack!
At first, she doesn't realise she has been slapped. All she could register was the ringing in her ears and the taste of blood. She touches her cheek. It hurts.
“Light!” Her mother screams, “What are you doing?!”
It's a little hard to focus, but she sees the shock in her brother's face as he stares at his hands. The ringing in her ears subsides.
She wails .
“I'm so sorry, Sayu,” he begs. He looks afraid (of what? their mother's wrath, her pain, or himself?). He looks afraid and Sayu can't stop crying, “I don't know why I did that.”
Everything is a blur after that. But she remembers this: throughout the night, Light's hands were shaking. She remembers the sting of ice against her bruise. She remembers wondering if he's scared of the violence he's capable of or because he likes it.
After one particularly bad fight of theirs, Light offers her an olive branch in the form of a question.
“Do you want me to teach you to find out when a person is lying?”
The question is asked so quietly that she almost doesn’t catch it. The remote they fought for lies between them, untouched. She almost turns her head away with a huff, but she can’t help but be curious. So with all the scorn she can muster, she scoffs, “Whatever. Do what you want.”
Light sees that as the acceptance it is and smothers a smile, “Let me tell you how to find out if mom is lying first.”
That catches her attention. She scoots closer to him, their fight all but forgotten, “How?”
This time, he lets his smile escape at successfully gaining her forgiveness and attention, “It’s in her eyes.”
She stares at him questioningly, “What does that mean?”
“It means,” he points to her eyes. His finger is too close. She doesn't dare close her eyes, “when she lies, her eyes don't match with her words. Her words would say she's feeling something and her eyes would speak of a different story.”
She frowns, “How can eyes say anything?”
He finally presses his finger on the side of her eye, “Look closer. One's eyes say everything.”
Sayu stares at her brother. He has brown eyes. They are pretty. When he smiles, his eyes don't crinkle. They don't light up. And when it does, it brightens the whole room. Now, as she watches him, she can't see anything. She hears him talk but she doesn't see anything. They are not empty, not dark, not bright, not happy. They are nothing.
“Okay,” she nods, hesitant. She'll have to test that on her mother instead, “What about dad?”
At that, Light leans forward, grinning. A smile that reaches his eyes. Sayu almost gasps at the sight. When he smiles like that, Light looked his age- just a boy with mischievous eyes and hands reaching out to catch the sun.
“This one's easy,” he explains, “because dad doesn't lie. At least not like others do.”
At her blank stare, he sighs and continues, “Dad doesn't like lying. So when he doesn't want to tell you the truth, he twists his words. He says the truth, but not the whole truth. It's called a lie of omission.”
“Ohhh,” she nods vigorously, “I still don't get it.”
Light rolls his eyes, “Okay, I'll give you an example. You know how you asked dad to take you to the amusement park tomorrow?”
She brightens at that, “Yes! And he said he will!”
“That was a lie.”
“What?!” She screams, jumping from the couch. Light shushes her wildly and pulls her back, looking around to make sure no one was coming.
“Okay, it's not a whole lie. Because he will take you to the amusement park. Dad doesn't lie. But he never said when he'll take you to the park, did he?”
Sayu deflates. Stupid adults and their stupid lies. She was so done with it all. She even bragged to her friends that she'll be going to the park! Now what will she tell them?
“Fine,” she grumbles, crossing her arms, “How else do people cheat other people? Ugh.”
Light doesn't seem to care about her mood change. If anything, he just seemed more excited to continue, “There are a lot of ways, actually. Every liar is different from the other and they all have different tells. It's all so very interesting.”
Sayu watches the way her brother almost seemed to glow, curious, “You seem to know a lot about this, Light.”
He pauses. And just like that, his mask is back on. He's still smiling but not like he did before. Still smiling, but she wishes he wasn't. He rubs the back of his neck sheepishly, “I observe people a lot. It's nothing, really.”
“Hm,” she sits up straight and meets his eyes. Brown and beautiful and unreadable. She asks, “How would I know if you're lying?”
This time, she gets a smile. It reaches his eyes and Sayu is suddenly cold. His smile widens and it's the most honest she has seen him look. Serene, smiling, honest. It scares her.
“You won't.”
Don’t get her wrong; Sayu doesn’t mean to say that there is something wrong with the Yagami household or that it isn’t as perfect as it seems. Because it is . It is just as perfect as it seems. Sachiko and Soichiro Yagami love their children dearly and have been nothing but great parents to them. Sayu loves her parents and her brother and wouldn’t want to change them for the world. Light is the perfect son. He is a good brother. The family lives a quiet, harmonious life filled with joy.
But sometimes when she looks at her brother, her breath catches in her throat. When he thinks no one’s watching, his eyes are devoid of light, of life and empty. He seems more like a hollow shell than a man, like a walking corpse than a boy. He looks lonely. He looks older than life. He looks tired.
Light Yagami is just as perfect as he seems, but there is something more to him than what meets the eye. He is a puzzle piece shoved down forcefully in the picture of the lovely Yagami family; he fits, but he isn’t supposed to.
She stares at their family portrait hung on her wall. It is a beautiful thing- filled with laughter and love. And Light stands beside their father, looking at the camera with a smile. He looks happy (does he?). He looks like he belongs (he doesn’t). The picture looks so perfect that it seems wrong. It makes her skin crawl.
She looks away.
Sometimes, her brother got angry.
It came out of nowhere, that anger. Burning, writhing, loud. It came when she sat in his room when he wanted to be alone, feet pressed down on the floor ( look at me. talk to me. don't you love me? where are you? come back. come back to me). It came when she refused to give him the TV remote when he wanted in the form of curses and a slap to her face. It came when she couldn't understand a single thing he said about math. It came when she asked him why he hated her ( because you're better than me, he had screamed, you are not me and I hate it) . It came and it came and it came.
But one day, it came no more.
One day, the sun rose and Light smiled. The sun rose and he forgot anger. The sun rose and he was all gentle blues and blunt edges. The sun rose and his eyes became nothing. The sun rose and he became so, so kind.
In school, when everyone started talking about how horrible, how annoying their siblings are, she could only stare with confusion. Because her brother was nice. Her brother was perfect. Her brother loved her.
All her friends cooed and told her how lucky she was to have such an amazing brother. She smiled and said, I know .
She did wonder, though, why her mouth tasted bitter.
When she is twelve, Sayu watches Ryuga Hideki’s first movie.
She talks about it for days; her mother, her friends, and hell, she even tried talking to her father about it. When that only left her with a stern lecture and disapproving look, she had gone to Light and him being the ideal brother he is, had listened to her drivel for hours on end.
On one such day, she sighed dreamily and announced, “One day, I’m going to date a guy like Ryuga and marry him.”
Light raised an eyebrow, “Isn’t it a little too early to think about that?”
Sayu scrunches her nose, seemingly offended, “Ugh, not you too! Just you wait, the day I finally gain a confession from Akagi-” she rolls her eyes at how lost he seemed, “The cute guy in my class! Jeez, Light, do you even listen to me? Anyways, I think he’s going to ask me out soon, so I’ll have a boyfriend in no time!”
He sighs, equal parts endeared and exasperated. He had always been good at that, making people feel like they’re loved, “Whatever you say. Now, focus on your homework. Tell me what this-”
“That reminds me,” she cuts him off, leaning towards him with a conspiratory smile, “Do you not like any girls in your class, Light? I’ve never seen you with any of them in school, either. Aren’t you famous? Surely you must’ve gotten a few confessions by now.”
He freezes for a second before looking down at her notebook. When he starts circling the mistakes she made with a pencil, she presses, “Aren’t you at least a little curious? You’re 16 already and have never dated anyone.”
“Hm,” his eyes are blank when he hums mechanically, “That is strange, isn’t it?”
She shrugs, “Kinda.”
He is sitting right beside her but when he speaks, Sayu feels like he has once again gone to that faraway place in his mind, “You’ve made 7 mistakes.”
“Aw, man!”
Light holds his chopsticks like their mother does. Their father’s favourite colour is blue and so is his. He learns karate, plays football and is the school’s student council president. He makes their parents so, so proud. He smiles at everyone and treats every adult he knows with respect because their mom taught him to do so. He wants to become a police officer because their father is one. He is Sayu Yagami, Soichiro Yagami, Sachiko Yagami, the actor she likes, her father’s favourite colleague, his friends, and the strangers he passes by on the street. Sayu looks at him but it’s not him , not really. He is a monster and angel of his own making and he tears the skin of a million different people, cuts off chunks of flesh, rips out rotten teeth and tender nails and wears it like they were his all along. She looks at him and doesn’t see him. She looks at him and wonders what he had done to Light Yagami, where he hid him. She wonders if he ever existed in the first place.
Then, she remembers. The imprint of his hand on her cheek still feels fresh and it burns along with the scream still stuck in her throat that she shredded raw when she was 4. She remembers the knives he used to have for eyes and the rage he used to tremble with.
She has seen Light. But as she stares at her patient, kind, loving brother, she is not so sure she wants to see him ever again.
(He goes on a date a week later. She shoves the thought of thieves and stolen faces and wingless butterflies out of her mind and asks him to tell her all about it.)
Sayu is good at chess. The best in her class, even. It surprises almost everyone around her; her teachers, her friends and even her parents. She had always been average at everything and when they suddenly see her be good at something so effortlessly, it seems almost wrong, dissonant with her picture. She agrees because it’s not her . She was never good at chess. Light was.
He taught her everything she knew about chess. She remembers every move she made during their first match, every word they exchanged. She remembers it when she is 13 and she will remember it when she is 19, 27, 56, 72. It’s not something that can be forgotten; nothing is when it comes to Light.
Light chose black. There is a joke somewhere about Light choosing black, but she is too occupied with arranging her side of the board to make it. White king on the black square, his queen standing proudly beside him. Bishop, knight, rook and the soldiers all stand tall in their positions, ready for her command. By the time she’s done, Light has started reading the magazine she had on her desk. She rolls her eyes and plucks it out of his hand.
“Focus, Light! You said you’ll teach me how to play!”
He raises his hands placatingly, “Okay, okay. I still stand by the point that I don’t have anything to teach you, by the way. You already know how to play the game.”
“Yes, but not like you do!” she crosses her arms and pouts, “I keep losing when I play with my friends and I don’t know why. So teach me how to play properly.”
“Hm.” he moves his pawn forward, “Alright then. Show me what you’ve got and I’ll show you what you’re doing wrong.”
She had barely made 4 moves when she lost her bishop. Light clucked his tongue disapprovingly, “Rookie mistake.”
She frowns, “But you had me cornered!”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did! I would’ve lost a piece anyway!”
“No, look,” he traces her move on the board, “You could’ve lost your pawn and kept the bishop.”
“Why does it matter? I’m losing one anyway.”
“That’s not how it works, Sayu,” he sighs and points at her line of soldiers, “Do you know why the pawns are always placed at the front and the others at the back?”
Sayu scrunches her eyebrows, considering. She suggests, “Because they are the main fighters?”
He shakes his head, “Because they are the most disposable.”
Her mouth forms a little ‘O’. One learns very early in their life that some people are more important than others, and some things more valuable. Sayu learns it from her father when he scolds her for breaking his watch and only laughs and tells her to be careful when she breaks the pot in their garden; She learns it from her brother when he says that some were born to die for others. She wonders then: what is she? The watch or the pot? The pawn or the bishop? The broken or the breaker?
She wonders, but she doesn’t linger. You have to remember, dear reader: thoughts are fleeting and dream-like when you are a child. Nothing is more important than the present. So she huffs, determined, and moves her pawn forward.
She isn’t really surprised when she loses that game. And the next one, and the one after that. In the fourth game, Light smiles when she narrowly avoids losing her queen, “Good. you’ve learnt how to protect what’s important.”
Sayu puffs out her chest, proud, “Of course! I don’t make the same mistake twice. Or uh. 4 times.”
Watching her with a fond smile, Light moves his knight forward without looking down. Sayu’s eyes snag on the move; a rookie mistake. This is the first time she has seen him make such a blatant error. He didn’t seem to realize what he had done. He was turning his neck left and right and easing the knots on his shoulders. Giddy, Sayu strikes down the knight with her bishop.
“Aha!” she exclaims, jumping from her seat. Her face splits into a pleased grin, “Got you!”
Light glanced down at the board. Sayu was too immersed in the joy of her victory to notice the glitter in his eyes and the barely concealed smirk dancing on his lips.
“Oh my,” he says lightly, tilting his head to the side, “You got my knight.”
Her grin grows impossibly wider. She sits down on the chair and kicks her feet back and forth, giggling, “I did!”
Sending a smile her way, he elegantly swipes off her bishop with his queen and settles back on his seat, “Checkmate.”
It takes her some time for the statement to sink in. When it does, her eyes dart around the board frantically. Blocked by her own pawn from moving forward. Death by the rook awaiting her if she dared to step sideways. A knight and queen ready to slash her down if she tried to step forward diagonally.
Her eyebrow twitches.
“You tricked me!” she accuses, pointing her finger at his face, “You were the one who said I should focus on protecting what’s important!”
And Light actually laughs. That sight distracts her for a moment. It’s not as if Light never laughed, you see. He did that plenty. But his laughs rarely contain true joy. This one was overflowing with it, filled to the brim with pure, unadulterated happiness. Sayu can’t help but smile with him.
He picks up his queen and rolls it between his fingers, “Here's the thing, Sayu,” despite herself, she finds herself leaning forward, enraptured. In a graceful, careless motion of his hand, Light swipes away all the pieces from the board. All except the king, standing proud. Proud and alone, “A kingdom is nothing without its King. Why do you think chess is centered around the King and not the other pieces? Why do you think the Queen, who is objectively so much stronger than the king, matters less than him?”
Sayu frowns, “I've always thought that was dumb. What's the point of saving the guy who barely does anything, anyway?”
Light shakes his head. He's still smiling that strange smile of his, “A kingdom is nothing without its king,” he repeats, “It's not about who is stronger. It's about power. A king doesn't fight. He kills, but the blood won't be on his hands. It's always about power. If a kingdom is his, who cares about the fallen pieces? They can always be replaced. A new queen, a new rook, a better knight. A king is the kingdom. Not its subjects, not its protectors. When a king falls, so does his kingdom.”
He sends her a grin like they are sharing a little secret of their own. At that moment, she could almost see it- Light, sitting on his throne, head tilted to the side with a smile that was more of a snarl. Light, with his clean hands and bloodied boots. Light, with his crooked crown and a kingdom that's his to fix, his to ruin.
It's about power. It's always about power.
“You've got it all wrong, Sayu,” he says, “Chess is not about saving the king. It's about conquering. It's about taking what's rightfully yours.”
She frowns, “That's not true. Any kingdom that isn't yours cannot be rightfully yours. You are just taking someone else's kingdom.”
Another smile that reaches his eyes. She knows she should be happy. She should be pleased that her brother is happy. But for some reason, her stomach drops. For some reason, in that second, she is afraid.
“The weak don't deserve that kind of power. If you are strong, every kingdom is yours to take, yours to rule. It always has been and always will be.”
Without taking his eyes off hers, he flicks her King out of the board. He falls to the floor. He falls to the floor.
He falls.
Light's eyes crinkle in a serene smile as he throws her own words back at her, “Got you.”
Sayu is good at chess. But every game she plays after that, she plays with her brother. Every game she wins, she loses in her mind. Even when her king stands victorious and proud, he sees Light's smile and hears his voice in her head.
Got you.
The year her brother turns 17, he falls in love with apples.
Every night, he picks up all the apples from the kitchen counter before he heads back to the room. And every morning, when their mother goes to his room to take the remaining apples, all she finds is an empty basket.
After his mother asks him about it, he laughs it off, saying he was craving apples all of a sudden. At one point, he stops taking the apples from their kitchen and yet, whenever she goes to his room to ask for his help with her homework, the basket on his table is filled with the blood red fruit.
Light doesn't like apples.
The year he became 17, Light fell in love with apples. That year, his eyes became knives again.
Sayu meets a strange man when she is whiling away time in an empty park.
He was a lanky man with eyes almost taking up half of his face (it made her remember the fun fact her friend Corey used to tell her in school: tarsiers have eyes that weigh more than their brain. Strangely, the man reminds her of it) and thick black hair that looked like it hadn't been washed for a disgustingly long time. Sayu eyes him warily when he sits on the swing beside hers. When he digs his feet in the sand, she watches with a frown- he wasn't wearing any shoes.
His eyes meet hers and she has to force herself to not jerk back. Ringed with black, they looked… haunted? No, that wasn't right. They looked like they knew all the secrets of the world. It weighed down his eyelids and dragged the skin beneath his eyes down. The weight of his gaze felt suffocating, alarming. She has the strangest urge to hide from him, to keep some of her secrets close to her chest.
He tilts his head to the side, “Sayu Yagami?”
She reaches for the pepper spray in her pocket, “And what is it to you?”
The man brings his thumb to his lips, observing her. His gaze pierces through her soul and she should walk away, she knows she should. But she finds herself frozen in place, tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth.
“I work with your father on the Kira case. You might've heard my name,” he bows his head slightly, feigning humility, “I am L. It's good to meet you in person.”
There were so many things wrong with those sentences but she chooses to address the worst one first.
“You are L?” She looks him up and down and crosses her arms, “No, you're not.”
He smiles, amused, “Yes, I am.”
Her lips curl in disbelief. There was no way this strange man was L. L was supposed to be a genius, a man known for his quick wit and confidence. Sayu had imagined he'd be someone tall, strong and handsome, with enough charisma to rival his intelligence.
The man in front of her was none of those things. In fact, he seemed like the opposite of them all and the more she stared at him, the more she got concerned about his posture. She shakes her head, “No, you're not.”
He huffs out a laugh, “Alright, would you believe me if I told you something no one but you and your father know?”
She eyes him warily, “Go on.”
“Very well,” he nods and clicks his tongue several times, “You recently got in trouble with Yagami-san for taking money from his wallet without his knowledge.”
Cheeks aflame, she sputters, “How did you know that?!”
He shrugs, eyes bright and mirthful, “I'm L. I know a lot of things.”
She narrows her eyes and hopes her cheeks have cooled down when she accuses, “Did you fix cameras in our house or something?”
Several clicks of his tongue follow her question. She watches curiously as he thumbs a strand of his hair and rubs his toes together in the sand. He's still smiling when he finally says, “No comment.”
That's as good as a yes. Sayu scrunches her nose and kicks her feet on the ground, making the swing move, “That's so creepy. You're so creepy.”
He doesn't say anything to that. They sit in comfortable silence, swaying back and forth in the swing. Sayu can't help but notice that the detective seemed to be in a constant state of motion- thumbing a strand of his hair (for no more and no less than 5 seconds) and trying to adjust the position of his legs to get comfortable. He kept bending his knees like he was trying to sit in a certain way but couldn't. And then there was the tongue clicking too.
She thinks about asking why he seemed so restless; he didn't even look uncomfortable with the silence. He seemed quite content with it, actually. She decides against it at the last minute; it's none of her business anyway. She digs around her bag and picks out two lollipops, taking the strawberry one for herself and offering the grape one to the older man, who seemed pleasantly surprised by the development. He accepts the lollipop with a grateful nod.
After he unwraps the candy, she finally asks, “So, what do you want from me?”
L pretends to be caught off-guard by the question, blinking innocently, “Whatever do you mean?”
She rolls her eyes, exasperated, before picking up the pace of her swing, “The world's greatest detective obviously didn't come here to play in the swing with me. There must be something you want.”
He looks pleased by her deduction, “You are smarter than people give you credit for, Sayu-san.”
She scowls like she isn't preening inside from the praise, “Just tell me.”
“Well, I wanted to meet Light-kun’s little sister,” he explains, “I was curious if you'd be anything like your brother.”
“Am I?”
He stares at her for an uncomfortably long time, making her squirm. When he speaks, he doesn't answer her question. Instead, he presents her with one of his own, “Are you good at keeping secrets, Sayu-san?”
Sayu groans, “Will you drop the honorifics already? I'm probably half your age.” After a second, she adds, “And I think I am, yes. Why do you ask?”
He seems to weigh his options before making up his mind. He snaps his fingers sharply before saying, “I think your brother is Kira.”
The statement takes an embarrassingly long time to set it and when it does, she isn't sure if she is going to laugh at him or choke on his words.
“That's ridiculous,” is what she manages to wrangle out of her throat,”There's no way my brother is Kira.”
There's something in his eyes; something too sharp to be amusement, something with too many teeth to be humour. Lethal. Like a shark circling the waters, waiting to draw blood. Like a predator ready to pounce. Waiting. Knowing.
“You don't sound so sure about that.”
She bristles, “Well, forgive me for being surprised when someone accuses my brother of being a serial killer.” She thinks she sounds a lot more convincing when she says, “Light is not Kira. You'd be insane to think he is.”
L hums, “Maybe I am insane. That doesn't mean he isn't Kira.”
Light Yagami is kind. He has a smile sweet enough to give someone rotten teeth. He helps with her homework with gentle words and never-ending patience. He is good, just and full of love. Light Yagami is her brother. He would never kill a man.
( Insect on the ground, wingless, lifeless. TV news turns to static. The ‘ideal’ world. Knives. Hunger. King.
God.)
L leaves like he came; with his eyes piercing through her soul and the weight of the world on his shoulders. Just before he gets into the sleek black car of his, he turns to her, “I hope this meeting will remain between us,” he smiles that strange smile of his, “I'll see you again, Sayu.”
(He won't)
The day Light joins the Kira investigation force, their mother makes tonkatsu and tempura.
It had been a while since her brother looked at food with anything other than disinterest or a vague sense of disgust. Has been a while since he looked hungry enough to abandon his chopsticks and use his hands to shovel every morsel of food in his mouth.
The day her brother joined the Kira investigation force, he feasts. And when his eyes drop to her plate, she finds herself pushing it towards him wordlessly. He shoots her a sweet smile, pleased. Her heart quickens. Run, run, run .
After he finishes, he licks his lips and cleans his fingers with his tongue when their mother isn't looking, down to every knuckle. He tips his chin up; doesn't bow, doesn't pray when he says, “Thank you for the meal.”
The day her brother joins the Kira investigation force, he becomes hungry again.
Her brother is happy.
Sayu watches him with his arm around Misa, sitting with his team, laughing. He has the life he wanted. He achieved his dream. He found love. He is happy.
His eyes are knives and they get sharper and sharper and he isn't hungry, no. He is a void. Voids aren't hungry. They don't eat. They consume, not because they want to but because that's their nature. Sayu watches his laugh and his eyes don't soften and she can't remember the last time they did.
He is happy. And isn't that fucking terrifying?
She returns home with her lips stitched together and her legs turned to wood.
Everything is blurry. She is safe. Is she safe? There is a gun aimed at her head and it's not there, really, but it still is. She is alive but at what cost? Her mother is hugging her. Her father is holding her. She can't speak. She can't cry.
The broken.
Light comes to see her. He holds her for a long time. He is warm.
The pawn.
He holds her face in his hands and presses their foreheads together, “I'm so glad you're safe, Sayu. I don't know what I would've done if you weren't.”
She watches him stand. She watches him walk away. She is delirious and nauseous and out of her mind and maybe that's why she is suddenly two and her arms are broken and his eyes are on hers and she doesn't see sorrow. She doesn't see guilt. She sees something much, much worse.
She sees disappointment.
Sometimes, grief doesn't let you cry.
It holds your head underwater till you're screaming but no one can hear you, not even yourself. You sit, silent, still as a statue. Mother is crying, You can't breathe. You sit still. You sit still.
Sayu inhales. The air smells like incense. Dad always hated the smell of incense , she thinks numbly. Everything was static. Her skin was crawling and everything was too loud and there was something trying to tear out of her chest, begging to be let out and she wants to but she can't and it hurts -
Light walks inside the room. His eyes find hers and cruelly, she is reminded he has their dad's eyes.
She breaks.
He takes two large steps forward and falls to his knees in front of her. Sayu throws herself in his arms, sobbing, “Light, I-”
Fingers carding through her hair. Shaking. Shaking. Shaking, “I'm here, Sayu.”
The sound that escapes her is almost animal, “Light, To-san is-”
He holds her closer, pressing her head on his shoulder. He is whispering something to her. Something soothing, maybe. Something kind. But she can't hear him. She can't hear anything other than the roar of blood in her veins and her weeping mind.
She holds onto him. She holds onto him and hopes, prays he will stay in her arms. Solid and warm. Her loving brother, her polaris, her saviour.
Please don't be Kira.
“It hurts,” she chokes, clawing at the back of his shirt, “It hurts so much .”
“I know. I'm sorry.”
Please just be my brother.
She cries and cries and cries, “Light.”
Please .
Mother is crying.
Matsuda places an awkward arm on her back, “I understand how hard this must be for you, Yagami-san. I'm sorry.”
“Light,” Her mom wails, hugging herself, “ Light .”
She should feel something. Something other than that numb, buzzing sensation taking over her body. Her mouth moved before she could stop herself, “Kira killed Light?”
Matsuda won't meet her eyes. He won't meet her eyes when he says, “Light-kun was killed during the fight against Kira, yes.”
They twist their words.
“Is Kira dead?”
One jerky nod. Matsuda finally meets her eyes, “Yes.”
Truth .
She hears a dull thump beside her. Her mom is on the floor. Wailing, wailing, wailing.
Mother is crying.
Aizawa crouches next to her. His hands clench helplessly by his side as if thinking of touching her arm. He decides against it before saying, “I'm so sorry for your loss.”
She can't stop speaking, “It's your loss too. I can't imagine how hard it is for you. He wasn't just your colleague. He was also your friend. Right?”
Aizawa's fist clenches. Unclenches. He gives her a rueful smile, “It has not been easy.”
Lie of omission.
“My brother was a good man,” her voice is flat. Like she has rehearsed this a million times, “He didn't deserve this.”
Aizawa's eyes are strained when he says, “No, he didn't.”
Lie .
Sayu’s eyes are dry. Her skin is numb. Buzzing. Her mother sobs, wails, breaks. She watches, silent.
Look what you did, Light.
You’ve made such a mess.
***