Work Text:
On his eighteenth birthday, Takeru became isolated from the rest of the world.
He was sitting at his desk in the portion of his apartment sectioned off as a study, surrounded by stacks of musty books caked with layers of dust as he furiously worked on the project proposal for his term paper. At that point in time, it was only the fifth week of the fall semester, but midterms had sprung upon him and the first year university student barely had enough time to complete all of his required assignments for his class, even with the (relatively) minimised distractions of living off-campus in a small L-shaped studio, alone and away from his home and his friends.
He must have nodded off some time during the write-up, days of exhaustion and sleep deprivation finally catching up to him, as he found himself jerking awake when he heard keys jangling in the lock of the apartment door. Sitting up straight, he swiveled his chair towards his apartment entrance, just in time to catch the door swing open and shut granting the visitor access and allowing the brunet to see who it was.
“Takeru?” There’s a pause as the speaker, who he immediately deduced was Akari--leaned against the wall, juggling the bag of groceries in her arms as she struggled to remove her shoes and slide her feet into slippers instead. She glanced up from her task the moment she achieved success and sighed, her expression turning warm with fond exasperation. “Asleep at your desk again. What am I going to do with you?”
Takeru couldn’t bite back his smile at her reaction, watching her step deeper into the living room to set the plastic bags down on the coffee table. “I’m fine--” he began to respond, only for her words to fully register in his mind. “Wait, asleep?”
Akari looked up from the takoyaki containers, vegetables, and the pastel-blue box, tied shut with a slim, red ribbon, procured from the bags. “You’re going to catch a cold at this rate if you continue sleeping at your desk without a blanket,” she lightly chastised. “I thought I might see you asleep since you seem like you’ve been pushing yourself lately, but the least you could’ve done was nap more responsibly.”
Now Takeru’s seriously confused and admittedly, worried. The way Akari spoke makes it sound like he’s not even conscious and attentive in the room, but he’s hearing her loud and clear and able to see everything that she’s doing. Not to mention how she gave no indication of hearing him. “I--”
His protest fell silent when his friend rose to her feet, closing the rest of the distance between the sofa and his self-made cubicle. “Maybe we’ll reschedule this for another day,” the physicist hummed, continuing her one-sided conversation. She leaned forward, propping her weight with one hand placed on the surface of the desk, the other reaching out towards Takeru with what is likely an intent to shake him awake, only for her motion to halt entirely. The colour drained from her face as her eyes rapidly scan up and down his form. “Takeru?”
He found himself even more worried at the abrupt change in emotion. “I’m right here,” he attempted to say, pointing to himself with an index finger, only to nearly jump in place when his friend screamed. “Akari?”
“Takeru? Takeru! No, no, please don’t let this be happening.” She’s reaching not towards him anymore, but through him now, shaking the shoulder that the brunet suddenly realised is not connected to him at all.
Slowly, he rose to his feet and turned around, seeing his body slumped over the desk. His swivel chair was not turned at all like he initially thought, instead remaining in the same position he’d originally left it. The meticulously stacked pile of books had scattered sometime in his sleep, books knocked askew both on the desk and on the floor--likely from when the weight of his form pushed against them. He could see his chest erratically rising and falling, despite the unfavourable angle of himself he’s granted, the steady rhythm of sleep noticeably missing from his body.
His body. Takeru looked down at his chest where Akari’s arm was still going through and wrenched himself away, stumbling backwards and colliding with the wall where the windows were. The glass panels vibrate with the sudden weight of his abruptly solidified form and he slid down against the wall, incomprehensibly staring and barely able to register Akari fishing out her smartphone from her pocket and dialing for medical help.
His body. His physical body was still right there. He shakily lifted a hand and stared down at it, uselessly opening and closing it around empty air. If his body was over there, slumped over his work desk, then what exactly is he now?
It didn’t take long for his apartment to suddenly become crowded, the first responders immediately rushing in and assessing the situation. Two paramedics carefully moved his body onto a stretcher and lifted him, while another attempted to console Akari, who’s shaken just as badly as Takeru. He could hear them and the police asking her what happened, only for her to tearfully respond that she didn’t know; that she had only come for a planned celebration, only to find him like this.
“Is anyone listening? I’m still here!” He wanted to shout, if only to allow himself to be heard and calm this sudden chaos. If only to pull the physicist into a tight hug and show her that he’s okay. If only to assure himself that this had to be some sort of nightmare, that he’s just sleeping after a long day of working, and that he would wake up to things perfectly back to normal the next day. But as most of the people in the apartment rushed out, Akari tailing closely behind them, Takeru knew that what he’s seeing was real. He knew the moment he tried to follow them, only to collide headfirst with an invisible barrier that he’s unable to breach no matter what he tried, he won’t be able to tell Akari that he’s not yet gone and be able to see her attempt to figure out a way to solve his current problem. He knew that this news would spread like wildfire to the rest of his family and he sank to the ground, pulling his knees to his chest and burying his face into his arms.
Living alone had admittedly been very lonely, considering just how lively the temple was before he moved out. But being unseen and unheard like this? It had to be the loneliest of all.
The news wound up reaching the rest of his family quickly as he had suspected. The first two faces that reappeared in the apartment were Makoto and Alain, their expressions grim, but determined. When the pair started knocking on neighbouring doors and asking questions, they had incurred a tense confrontation with the building’s landlord and the police over disturbing the public and attempting to interfere with a job that was not theirs, the situation alleviated only when Kanon and Alia intervened. Takeru took care to stay away from them on the days they came, unintentionally sinking into the apartment floor in fear of being walked through again. But as time passed and the two continued to come up empty-handed, both Makoto and Alain gradually stopped coming.
After Makoto and Alain left, then Onari came, followed closely by Shibuya and Narita. Even their prayers and mantras could do nothing to bring Takeru’s voice to the ears of the living, even on the days when Takeru was able to pull himself out of his sorrow to sit cross-legged on the floorboards and join them. They, too, began to stop coming, exhausted, tired, and defeated by the continuous lack of success despite culminating all of their practices.
The one who’d held out the longest of Takeru’s extended family was Akari. Despite the consoling hands on her shoulders from Makoto and Alain, despite the silent shakes of the head from Shibuya and Narita, she had hung on for the longest. Over and over again, she inspected the studio apartment from nook and cranny for clues, first with her own eyes and when that didn’t help, using some of her own original apparatuses. Even when the police called off the case, stating that there was no foul play or evidence of a possible break-in, Akari still held on.
Takeru wasn’t sure when she had come to realise and accept that he wouldn’t be able to return to their lives after all. He’s also not sure when he came to accept that for himself, either.
When Akari finally laid her investigation to rest, there was nothing holding Takeru’s extended family back from carefully gathering his items into cardboard boxes, sealing them up with masked tape and taking them away. Still trapped within the confines of the apartment, the student could do nothing but watch them leave, yearning more and more to just be able to reach out and speak with them again. A hug, a whisper, even just a ‘good-bye.’ A sense of closure if only to ease them (and perhaps himself as well). If he still possessed his smartphone, maybe he could’ve sent a message to them, even if there was the possibility that they may think that someone was playing a horrid prank on them after being given his former number.
With the vacancy of the apartment, new tenants finally began to move in, unaware of what had transpired, but even they too came and went. Although Takeru still had no idea what led him to separate from his body to begin with, he found himself able to control his state of being enough to be able to interact with objects. He still could not be heard or seen, but his attempts at drawing attention to his existence were visible. First the tracing of a character in the dust; then another, and another, to a phrase, to a complete sentence, to a paragraph. With more strength and control, the brunet was able to proceed to moving physical objects: a cup by a few centimetres, a child’s ball, even an adult-sized chair. If he could communicate, reach out, quell his loneliness, then maybe he could even take the next step of finding out what happened to him and how to remedy it.
Unfortunately, his actions seemed to do little more but terrify the renters, who left immediately as soon as their contracts would allow them, birthing the rumour of haunted property. When the rumour spread far enough through the use of the internet and word of mouth, the unit became vacant for extended periods of time, even when the landlord attempted to lower prices to an accessible value, attempting to entice any prospective mover. No one took the offer for the next four years--until finally, someone did.
Takeru curiously watched from his niche above the foyer, his form solid enough to sit against the plaster instead of sinking through it. The new person was at the door, shaking hands with the movers and bidding them farewell before shutting it, pulling the latch across. With puffy black hair, voluminous and slightly messy from all the movement and unpacking of the items, the new resident appeared to be an adult in his late twenties. Judging by all the book titles, he was likely an educator of some sort; Teach Scratch to Kids , Coding for Young Whizzes , The Pedagogy of a Classroom ...
Takeru kicked off the ceiling and floated through the air, slowly descending behind the new occupant, who was cutting open one of his boxes and pulling out what appeared to be a custom-built desktop. Having seen a fair amount of residents coming and going, he knew better than to delay showing signs of his presence. Even with his attempts at being friendly, he could understand the fear and terror over residing in a home that seemed to house another--a supernatural being, at that. It felt awful causing that fear, even if he didn’t have the intention of doing so in the first place.
“Hello,” he began, slipping back into his routine, “are you the new tenant?” Speak first, then begin to try and communicate through writing or movement. Although the college student found that no one could ever hear him speak, keeping that first step remained as a bit of comfort to him. Hearing the words falling from his lips reminded him that he was still ‘alive,’ that he still existed, that he still retained his voice.
What Takeru didn’t expect was for the new person to be able to hear him.
The shuffling within the cardboard boxes ceased, the other individual in the room withdrawing his arms to slowly turn away from his current task, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. He quickly glanced around the living room before tentatively speaking:
“Is someone there?”
A beat of silence passed as Takeru stared, wide-eyed. Before he could think more of it, he rushed forward and stopped directly in front of the other, realising with a start that he’s not being looked through as he was with all the previous renters but rather, looked at . There’s no denying it with the way the other’s dark brown hues sharpened in a mixture of disbelief and muted alarm, or by the way he instinctively flinched back, the space between the two smaller than intended due to a miscalculation on Takeru’s part.
“Are you the new tenant?” the history student repeated, stifling the quiver of hope in his voice. The repercussions of being on his own for four years, unheard, unnoticed, and unacknowledged, suddenly rushed over him with a pang, and he found his fingers reaching up and clasping around the cool grid of sterling silver dangling between his clavicles. To suddenly have human interaction again after so long ached. Painfully .
The repetition of the question elicited an uncertain and lopsided smile from the raven-haired man. Despite the apparent confusion and mild unease, Takeru didn’t sense any underlying hostility emanating from the other. “That would be me,” the newcomer confirmed, “I just finished completely moving in.
“I’m sorry,” he continued, “I didn’t--” he cut himself off, breaking eye contact and rubbing the nape of his neck, shuffling in place. “I didn’t realize that I had a roommate? I thought I signed a lease for an unoccupied studio.”
Now, it’s Takeru’s turn to awkwardly smile. “Well,” he weakly laughed, “you’re technically correct. Apartment 1004 has been long-vacant for four years, with only periodic moments of residency. You’re the first person in--” He turned to the faded white paint of the living room wall, pale with the exception of a crooked rectangle where the previous family’s calendar used to hang. “--I think half a year, to move in.”
“Right! Half a year,.” The newcomer snapped his fingers, brightening up and nodding. “That’s what the apartment description said too on the site I used. It had fairly low reviews but the price of this place was just too affordable. I couldn’t pass up something like this..”
Strange how the other made no mention of the rumours, which the brunet was sure was plastered all over all the apartment hunting websites. “You’re taking a big risk,” he noted, purposefully inserting enough curiosity in his words to not inadvertently come across as rude; “renting a place that’s not rated high.”
The other shrugged, not at all offended. “A lot of the reviewers talked about the same thing,” he explained, “but they didn’t really make that much sense. Pay them no mind and filter them out, and the rest of the reviews are fine. I also asked for pictures, so I didn’t come in completely blind.”
And there they were--still not explicitly mentioned, but those reviews had to have been it. Still, to be this nonchalant about this unit, which had chased most potential residents (and actual tenants) out in the first place; either the other was a non-believer, he did not think the words were true, or he just didn’t care. Regardless of what it was, Takeru wasn’t going to press him. The fact that he was heard and seen was already enough to invigorate him and make him feel a kind of hope he hadn’t felt since he became trapped. It had been enough to let him forget about the loneliness he had been seized with, to be able to enjoy human interaction again.
The other was beginning to speak again. Takeru forced himself to focus.
“I should get back to unpacking,” the man spoke; “I’m supposed to be going back to work tomorrow and the last thing I want to do is leave a mess, especially now that I know I’ll be co-living with a roommate. I’m definitely not going to have any energy tomorrow after I come back.”
He smiled at Takeru. “I’m Emu Hojo, by the way. Hope we continue to get along!”
The brunet returned the expression with one of his own, the gesture coming easily to his lips, almost as if he had still been speaking with his extended family and sharing a large meal together. “Takeru Tenkuji,” he returned, playfully giving the other a salute. “It’s nice to meet you, Emu!”
“You too, Takeru. I’ll see you around!”
The moment Emu fully turned his attention back to unpacking his belongings, Takeru turned around to walk away, back to the foyer of the unit, past the solid door, and out into the hallway, where solidified his form enough to lean back against the door and shut his eyes.
Four years. Four long years of silently wondering, pleading, despairing, that perhaps no one would ever be able to hear him again. See him. Be aware of his continued existence.
After all this time, someone finally has.