Tadashi’s Apartment
Tokyo, Japan
January 2016
Sato, Tadashi
It’s been…a while since Aether discovered that Mathieu had left her.
The note she had discovered only had a few words on it; barely even reaching three sentences. It seemed like it had been scrawled in a rush judging by the handwriting. I had returned with her to her own apartment and looked at it myself.
I love you I’m sorry I had no choice
She had managed to get through the first line before crumpling the paper in her hands and breaking down in tears once again.
“We should get back,” I managed. She could only bolt out of the apartment after hearing me say that, leaving me alone in apartment with nothing much left. Once the heaviness of the situation set in, I found myself realizing why she wanted to spend time away from what had been her ‘home’ with Mathieu.
We were the only ones who knew. Aether couldn’t contact Kenichi due to the latter being busy in the States, and he was the only one who had close ties to Mathieu. Aside from him, there was no one else we could ask help from. I had offered her the option of perhaps tracking him down and using HQ’s contacts, but she had declined and instead told me that she wanted to move on by herself.
Aether ‘moved’ into my apartment a few days after the Incident.
She arrived with a packed duffel bag or two, a blotchy face, and teary eyes. As soon as I opened the door, she had quietly asked if she could stay over with me for the next week for two. Aether didn’t really explain why even though I accepted the request. Before I knew it, she was already inside and seated on my couch, curling into a ball and starting to cry.
And I didn’t know why. Not at all.
The poor girl was inconsolable; it took a cup and a half of tea until she had finally calmed down and told me what exactly had happened the a number of days ago.
She had come back from work and noticed that Mathieu wasn’t there. Shrugging it off, she thought that he would be coming home late and did the usual: she reheated the leftovers from the previous nights, made her self a cup of coffee, and busied herself with work until she fell asleep. Aether explained that Mathieu coming home late wasn’t an abnormal thing; there was an instance where he arrived at three in the morning and ended up collapsing on the bed then sleeping right there and then.
The next morning, however, he still wasn’t there. A little worried, she rang up Kenichi, but the call went straight to voicemail. She called later again in the afternoon and reached his secretary, who had apologized and said that Kenichi suddenly had to leave for a business trip abroad. After ten minutes of the lady explaining that it was for a business convention in the States, Aether ended the call and decided to call Mathieu up on his cellphone.
The call went straight to voicemail as well.
So she had waited another day.
Mathieu still wasn’t there. She grew angsty and resisted the urge to call up Kenichi’s secretary and push for more details. She resisted the urge to ask her if Mathieu had gone with Kenichi (then again, it was very probably, granted how Kenichi tended to rely on Mathieu for other matters). Finally, Aether decided to to a quick sweep of the clues for anything Mathieu might have left behind.
And then she saw the note.
“You’re going to have to go back to your apartment soon, you know.”
“You kicking me out already, Tadashi?”
“Not exactly. You know I don’t mind you staying here, even though I keep telling to you to take the bed.” Aether gives a weak smile and covers herself with the blanket I had let her borrow. “I swear, Aether, you should take the bed.”
“I don’t mind the couch,” she replies. Takes a sip from the warm mug of coffee in her hands and soon bundles further back into the blanket. “And…I don’t think I can go back to my apartment yet, really. I don’t think I can,” she says quietly. “Not yet. I don’t want to go back to my apartment.”
“Because there’s still traces of him there,” I finish. Aether doesn’t say anything but it’s evident in her eyes that that’s the case. I merely stand up and pry the coffee mug from her hands, “I’ll get you a bit more coffee. Yours is running cold.” She only manages a nod before closing her eyes and embracing a nearby pillow tightly.
I exhale and turn back to the kitchen to get her another mug of coffee.
* * * * *
She’s been silent to the world.
This is how Aether copes.
Two to three weeks have passed. Peters has noticed that for some reason, there’s been a change. Mack as well. Both of them have been asking me what’s been going on with Aether, but I just keep silent and refuse to say anything. It’s her business, I told them. When she’s ready and willing to tell, then you’ll know. But for now, just let her have her time.
Mack accepted hesitantly yet kept an eye on her.
Peters, on another hand, tries to gauge out information from her. Aether remained resilient and stony, unwilling to tell despite having known Peters for more than two years. At this point, they’re extremely close friends. Closer than I’d have expected.
But even then, she wasn’t willing to tell what had happened.
More time passed. She’s been working herself into a daze, working and working and working the pain out. I noticed. Peters noticed. Mack noticed. Most of HQ noticed the change in attitude and just like us, were unable to understand and unable to accept why she had suddenly gone that way.
I kept her secrets. Mack eventually caught on. He told Peters, who was livid at what had happened. I found out that they knew and begged them to keep silent about the whole affair. It was Aether’s situation, after all. Not ours. It wasn’t our fight.
Peters and Mack exchanged a glance but said nothing at all.
Eventually, the two had managed to cook up their own masterplan. I warned them against it but they didn’t listen, insisting that it was the necessary path which had to be taken.
“Our S.H. is working herself to hell. That’s not healthy,” Mack tells me. His glance is on Aether the entire time as she drinks coffee while checking reports. “None of that is healthy, T. Her coping mechanism isn’t healthy either.”
“We can’t force her to move on.”
“But we can help her,” Peters interjects. “You know what she needs at this time?” When I don’t answer, he answers his own question. “She needs us. I know Aether. She doesn’t want to be alone. She has this whole issue about being alone. I know because I’ve seen her drunk and I’ve brought her home. She’s got this certain trauma about being left alone. And the more we don’t reach out to her,” he drops his voice, “The more she’ll get the wrong message and continue making a machine out of herself.”
A machine.
A soulless machine.
“He’s got a point,” Mack tells me.
I exhale and find myself looking at them. Mack’s face contains that expression of worry, which is new since he isn’t really the paragon of ‘giving a shit’. Peters just looks back at me, meeting my gaze calmly instead of one with passion as he tended to have while we were theorising for the investigations.
“Alright,” I finally agree. “Okay. Just tell me what we have to do for her.”
The blue-eyed American relaxes. “We start this weekend.”
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