Chapter Text
It was too cold to be outside. Jotaro flexed his fingers, cupping them and blowing hot air into his palm.
It gave him no real comfort, no real warmth.
he sighed softly as he leaned back into his car seat, one hand fidgeting with the peeling leather skin on his steering wheel. he didn’t like this idea at all, his wife, ex-wife now, had insisted anyway. It’ll be good for you, Jotaro. It won’t hurt.
that’s where she was wrong, it would hurt. It would hurt so much.
Jotaro wondered how much Kakyoin had hurt that night under the beeping of the machines they’d hooked up to his body. The hospital had been so quiet. It had been late at night when Jotaro woke up from the “nap” he’d been taking in the seat beside Kakyoin’s hospital bed.
He remembered watching Kakyoin breathe, swallowing the lump in his throat as his eyes fixated on a trickle of sweat that had made its way down the redhead’s throat and beneath his flimsy hospital gown.
he remembered painfully tearing his eyes and his mind away as Kakyoin began to stir from sleep too. Over the days he’d been hospitalized, Kakyoin had possessed a look of perpetual sadness on his face—he was scared to die before he had even lived.
Jotaro had parked his car in front of the cemetery gates. He watched snow fall gently on the headstones laying beyond the iron gates. It was one of Jotaro’s small perversions that one day he’d see one with his name on it.
loving son and father, it would say.
What a joke. Jotaro had never been either of those things. To his mother he had been a complete jerk, sure he had been young and hotheaded, sure he’d traveled all the way to Egypt to pull her back from the threat of death, but nothing had changed after. Not really.
to his daughter Jotaro was endlessly apologetic. He didn’t wish she hadn’t been born, he wished he himself hadn’t been—she deserved a father that could love her properly—not just say it. Not that he could say it either.
Maybe deep down he did love his daughter, but what was the point? When he couldn’t even be a man and prove it to her?
unwillingly, Jotaro opened the door, stepping out into the cold bite of winter’s breeze. He shivered, teeth chattering as he pulled his coat tighter around his body. He let go then, feeling he didn’t deserve it.
The cemetery was empty, only the graves remained. Were they waiting? Jotaro didn’t see why that was, the dead were much better off.
he pushed the frosty iron gate open, shuffling his feet on the light layer of dark snow.
The cemetery wasn’t one of those big, fancy ones, Kakyoin’s mother had insisted it be one closer to home. Meaning Jotaro would have to drive an hour or so to get here. He often used that excuse to avoid coming, much to the dismay of Kakyoin’s mother.
Jotaro didn’t like the way she would look at him, like she knew. What did she know? She knew nothing.
she would call him sometimes, begging him sweetly to come over sometime for dinner, I could show you his room, he’d want you to have his things. Jotaro would decline politely every time, insisting Kakyoin’s things remain in his room.
Jotaro doubted Kakyoin would want him to have his stuff, not after what he’d done in that hospital room. Or what he hadn’t done.
he made his way past the graves, he knew where Kakyoin’s was. The only time he’d visited it was on the day of the funeral. Its location was still very much engraved in Jotaro’s mind.
Seventh row, the last one to the right.
he walked past the fourth row, clenching his fists. This was entirely pointless, what was the point in making him do this?
Today was Jolyne’s graduation party. He was supposed to be there. Maybe he should be there instead of here, but then again, she probably didn’t want to see him again.
she’d said so herself and Jotaro couldn’t really blame her. Who misses their daughter’s sweet sixteen? her seventeenth birthday soon after.
Jotaro hadn’t been present for most of them.
he walked last the sixth row, he was breathing hard now, blood rushing to his head.
the seventh row loomed close, he stood deathly still, staring straight ahead. He couldn’t bring himself to turn right.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck…” He cursed, slapping his hand repeatedly on his forehead.
he was such a coward. Was he really scared of a dead boy? a dead boy that had once looked at Jotaro like he held up the world on his shoulders.
he didn’t serve such devotion, not from someone like Kakyoin.
Jotaro was breathing harder, his heart thumping so hard in his chest he felt like it would burst from his chest.
sweat gathered on his palms despite the cold and his eyes began to sting.
Kakyoin had looked so hopeful that night, sad yes, but undoubtedly hopeful and beautiful. Jotaro scoffed bitterly, what had he expected from him? To tell him that he loved him too?
Yes. Yes, maybe that’s exactly what he expected. But Jotaro could not offer anything like that. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t what was right.
what was right was his marriage, the birth of his daughter, the expectant gaze in his mother’s green eyes. That’s what a man should be.
His father had never been there for his mother, nor him, it was only right for Jotaro to want to be better.
Now he felt like he was much, much worse.
Jotaro started to hyperventilate, his green eyes fluttering shut as he collapsed to the ground. His legs met the cold cruelty of snow and he did not move, and he felt he deserved it.
he couldn’t control it, not anymore, tears streamed down Jotaro’s face, sticking to his skin.
he didn’t sob, he just let it happen as he looked up at the sky.
The sky wasn’t grey, rather a pretty light blue, it reminded him of the dress Jolyne had wore on her 2nd birthday, she had hated it, kicking and fussing and crying—she picked it and now she says she doesn’t like it! Jolyne’s mother had gasped, exasperated as she handed Jotaro his crying daughter.
Jolyne had looked up at her father with those big, soft green eyes of hers—so much like his own—and sniffled.
they stared at each for a long time, Jotaro didn’t know what to say or do, only that he found himself thinking that Jolyne looked so lovely in her little blue dress.
She had stopped crying and just sucked on her thumb, staring curiously up at her father’s face, wondering why he was smiling so softly.
Snow and dirt gathered beneath Jotaro’s fingernails as he dug into the earth, looking for something to ground him against the tumultuous tides of misery that struck him so suddenly now, from every direction.
“Dad?”
Jotaro stiffened, his eyes widening. That was Jolyne’s voice. There was no doubt about it, he’d recognize it anywhere.
He said nothing. Maybe she’d go away if he made himself as invisible as he possible. She shoudn’t see him cry, and when she did, what would he say? What reason would he offer?
“Jolyne.” It wasn’t a question, “What are you doing here? How’d you find me?” This was.
it was now his daughter’s turn to stiffen. He couldn’t see her face, his back was turned to her, but he could already the picture the pout on her face, the way she’d grip her left forearm with her right hand and shrug.
“Mom. Mom told me you’d be here.”
Jotaro nodded, he stayed down, too scared to move. He didn’t dare let Jolyne see his face. “I thought today was your…your graduation party.” His voice trembled.
He could hear Jolyne shift, shiver and swallow.
She shrugged again.
“I don’t know…I guess,” Her voice trembled now, but she didn’t give up the tough act. He hated how similar they were.
“I guess I just needed my dad there.”
To that Jotaro has nothing to say.
she was moving now, coming closer. Jotaro didn’t have it in him to say anything to stop her anymore.
”Dad are you crying?” She whispered, one hand on his shoulder. Jotaro could feel the hesitation in her touch.
“Yes. Yes, I am.”
She nodded, sniffling decisively.
“Okay. Me too. Asshole.”
Jotaro looked up to face his daughter’s side profile. She turned away from him, looking at the last grave to the right. “You’re here to see him.” She didn’t ask, she knew the answer of course. No doubt her mother had told her.
Jotaro hadn’t said much about Kakyoin to anyone—nothing past surface level.
“So what are you doing here on your knees? Get up. Old man.”
she was pulling him up now. Gripping his arm and tugging. Tugging like a child with her toy. Begging. “Dad,” She gasped, “Dad, get up. Dad,” Jotaro shuddered. His legs felt heavy, his head even more so.
“Dad, please—“
He pulled his arm from her grip gently, slowly, like he was afraid he might hurt her—more than he had already had.
Slowly, inexplicably, he began to crawl past the graves to the right. Shuffling his knees like it hurt to move. And maybe it did.
Kakyoin’s headstone was simple one. A cross above his name though he’d confided in Jotaro numerous times that he felt there was no god—how could there be? He had said, when the world was so cruel.
Jotaro wrapped his arms around the stone, uncaring anymore what Jolyne thought of him as she stood over him. He could hear her sniffle, fidget with her coat. she didn’t say anything, there were no words left to say.
Jotaro set his forehead against the smooth stone, biting down on his lower lip so hard he could feel the warmth of his blood trickle down his chin and stain the white snow. The red of it was vivid, deep. The same color as those cherry earrings Kakyoin had worn, Kakyoin had liked cherries. They were his favorite fruit.
He’d get him as many cherries as he wanted, if only he’d come back to him.
no, what would Kakyoin think? Seeing him in such a state, such a pathetic state. It was suddenly such a very terrifying thought, Jotaro’s tears soaked the grey stone.
“He your friend?” Jolyne clicked her tongue, correcting herself under her breath, “was”.
Jotaro leaned back, staring blankly at the headstone. He was feeling too much. More than he had in years.
“Yes.”
“You must’ve loved him a lot.”
Jotaro hated the note of jealousy in her tone.
Jotaro sat in the passenger seat of his own car, his head against the window. Snow-covered trees, houses and cars sped past as Jolyne drove. To where, neither knew.
they sat in endless silence. Not the uncomfortable kind.
But Jolyne had always been a stubborn girl.
“Do you love him?”
Jotaro pressed his finger into a little hole in his pants. “I don’t know what that means.”
“Do you love my mom?”
He twisted his finger, digging his nail into the cold skin of his thigh.
“Do you…Do you love me?”
His eyes moved, focusing on his daughter’s side profile. “More than anything. That’s all I know for sure, Jolyne. I’ve always cared for you.”
Jolyne said nothing, he could tell she was tempted to scoff.
they drove for another fifteen minutes before she broke the silence again. “Do you…are you gay?” Jotaro studied her face, watching her grimace once the words left her mouth. She didn’t look at him.
He stopped for a long moment. Was he gay? It wasn’t really a matter of doubt, not really, he’d known for sometime but dismissed it. Nothing good would come out of it. It wasn’t right.
“What would it mean…if I was?”
He’d caught her attention now.
Jolyne turned to face him briefly, biting the inside of her cheek. “I dunno.” She paused, tilting her head then shaking her head, “I suppose…I suppose it wouldn’t matter, Dad.” She nodded, “I don’t-I don’t know what all this means. I don’t know how to help you, dad. You don’t tell me anything, no one tells me anything—“
Jotaro sat up straighter, and for the first time in a long time, he reached over and wrapped his arms around his daughter, hugging her too tight.
He hugged her for a long time, (Jolyne had had to pull over), just holding her. He didn’t care if she didn’t hug him back.
Jotaro apologized profusely, stopping for a few seconds after every “sorry” that left his mouth before continuing.
“You don’t have to help me, Jolyne. I’m not your responsibility.” He leaned back, placing his hands on his daughter’s shoulders as he looked into those red-rimmed green eyes.
“But you are mine.”
He sighed, looking down, swallowing the lump in his throat before looking back up at his daughter. “I don’t know how to do this.”
Jolyne laughed shakily, “Yeah, you’re shit at this. Even worse than me.”
he couldn’t help but laugh too. “I know. I just…I just want you to know that I can’t promise you anything, Jolyne. I wouldn’t, I’m not that much of a monster. But I’ll try, Jolyne. I will.”
She pursed her lips, side-glancing at him, “that’s kind of a promise too, y’know.”
Jotaro nodded, “I don’t know what else to do. I just need you to know, Jolyne.”
she leaned back against the car seat, staring straight ahead she murmured, “I know. I know you will, Dad.”