One hell of a surgery, one week in critical intensive care, and three days in the inpatient ward. Those were what I needed to recover at least 75% of my life. I woke up in the middle of the hospital room alone that day. My mother went back home to get some supplies. What was it? I remember the doctor told me about how badly injured I was and how it was a miracle that I even survived. Three days of bed rest weren’t enough for me to take in that fact. After a while, Akira walked in.

“You’re awake.”

“Hey, Aki. Finally you visit, eh?.”

“Sorry. The volunteers needed help all around Seventh Sector. There was too much damage here and there.” Hearing that, I got up in my bed.

“Casualties?”

“One. You.”

“You sure about that?”

“Rubbles are all cleaned up and we found nobody else. That’s pretty much what I know.” Akira pointed at the corner as he explained. “By the way, Sarah and Timothy’s mom came by bringing that.”

Balloons enough to fill up an entire cart. I chuckled when I saw it. I reached out to the side table and took a book mom brought for me to distract myself. For the past three days, since I regained my consciousness, I tried to gain more information on what actually happened to no avail. There’s no news about it, nor were there rumors about what was going on. Even the nurses and staff I talked to seemed like they forgot what happened.

“What are you looking at me like that for?”

I noticed Akira staring at me. He had guilt written all over his face. Ugh, really, Akira? At a time like this?

“I found out earlier that you stopped taking antidepressants.”

“Ah, Dr. Burke told you?”

“Yes, the information was needed for the surgery. Why didn’t you tell me? Six months, Sota. I heard you have stopped taking in since six months ago.”

“Four. Regardless, it must have slipped my mind. Sorry.”

“That’s not the point. Your reflux was gone, too, wasn’t it?”

“Obviously. It was caused by stress. If it’s gone, then the reflux would too.”

“But it came back? I saw you taking those at the restaurants.”

I stayed silent.

“It was thanks to Maria, wasn’t it?”

“So that’s what you’re trying to make me say,” I looked away from Akira, to the opened window. The wind felt annoyingly good and the blue sky was disturbingly calm. I shook my head. “No, it wasn’t.”

“I see.” I could see Akira from the reflections on the window. He looked down to the apple that he was peeling. His hands stopped. “It’s just that I— Sota, I’m sorry—”

“Let’s not. It’s not that simple of a matter.”

“Sota, you—”

“What do you want me to say?” I looked at him, slowly losing my temper. “One look at your face that day and I knew exactly what happened. You probably heard about our friendship from someone so you approached her because you’re worried about me. Give it one or two months, you would easily fall in love and ask her out. I know exactly what happened without you even telling me. Not saying anything to both me and Maria was just about you trying to be considerate.”

Akira stayed silent the whole time.

“See? Silence confirmed all that. What do you want me to say? That I forgive you? It doesn’t work that way, my dear brother. I missed my chance and she doesn’t see me that way. Whether you were there or not, it won’t change anything. So don’t piss me off by feeling sorry like you did something wrong.”

I could see the guilt on his face turned to sour. He stood up facing me.

“I was waiting for you. After all this time you still don’t trust me? Is that how it is? You still think I would ruin your life? After all this time?”

“Like I said, it’s not that simple!” I lost my temper and yelled at him.

“Explain, then!” Akira grabbed my shoulders. His face looked like he was about to cry. “You either talk too much or nothing at all but all of those are exactly the same. You just never explain to anyone what’s going on inside your head! How would I know what you feel?”

The pause that followed was filled with tension strong enough to push the mountain. It was death, wasn’t it? In front of me was a man who thought that he wronged his brother right before the brother’s death. These two weeks were a skip for me but for him it was the longest time drowning in guilt. Hearts on his sleeves. That was the reason why I admired him. I took a deep breath and pushed his hands to the side.

“How could I tell you if I’m the one having doubts about it? Is it good? Is it bad? Right? Wrong? Am I taking advantage of her vulnerabilities?”

I got up, dragging the IV line with me. I walked past him towards the door.

“That’s how it always is. It’s my own doing. Overthinking? Analysis? The truth is I’m just full of doubts, afraid of everything. I tried, Aki. I tried to be more like you but, in the end, I couldn’t be as confident or sure about what I wanted. I couldn’t be brave enough to take my chances. There’s no such thing as unlucky episodes. It’s all my own fault. It’s not you that I don’t trust. It’s me.”

“Sota, that can’t be true. Do you know how many times you—”

“Aki, the only unlucky event I had was not being born as you.” I stared at him, gauging his reaction. He didn’t say a thing in response so I continued to the door. “Now please leave me alone for a while. I’ll be back as normal in a week but everything literally hurts right now. Even I have a limit of how much pain I can hide.”

Slowly, I walked away from the room.

“Liar. Even now you’re completely hiding everything.”