Visiting Hours

(The next morning)

(Okita)

“Hey, you have a visitor,” an officer comes to my cell, looking at me. It’s then I recognize him – he is that young man I met near Yagi-san’s house.

So he was a cop, I was -right-. But if I have a visitor, it can only be Hide-san – she’s found me, and can get me out. I wave to my friend “Zanza”. “Well, this is probably my ticket out – best of luck to you!”

It’s rather cruel when I get to a small room, and there’s a window on one wall, with some small holes cut into it, as on the other side… is not the Yagi Hide I want to see.

I sit down in the chair. “Oh, hello, Yagi-san,” I say, a bit deflated. But she’s looking rough, with shadows under her eyes. “I’m in jail now, you don’t have to worry so much,” I say in a lighter tone. “No sword, no nothing, just a roommate who called me ‘cute’.”

She’s quiet for a long time. “They said I could only have a few minutes. Hajime told me where to find you, the name you’re here under. I thought that I said what needed to be said, the other day at the dojo – goodbye.”

“Not done with me yet?” I say, shaking my head with a bit of a smirk. Hide-san was right…

She looks at me, and her eyes look tired beyond the dark circles. “I am done with you… but I’m trying to reconcile the past. A good friend – a true friend, unlike my sister – came to see me, and to help me understand my current situation. She was kind, and wise… and devastating.” She takes a deep breath. “You know Hajime as well as anyone. And he’s changed, just since you saw him last, isn’t he?”

“He has,” I say. I know, as a woman, she has no sense of ki, but I suppose they have their own ways. “I could tell – he felt more alive when I he told me he was a ghost than he did the other day.” I grin a bit. Even when he took me in to be arrested, he was just… quiet. Like he wasn’t even there.

She nods, then looks down. “My friend… she helped me realize that I don’t understand Hajime. How he thinks… how he loves.” She looks at me, with sad eyes. “I thought he was consumed by an ugly jealousy of you, how toxic… but he thought that I still loved you, and that, given the chance, I -should- be back with you. He called you… my dream.” She smiles a bit, but it’s not the smile I remember. This one is… bittersweet.

“And in a way, you were my dream for so long, Souji,” she sighs. “You went away to die, and I got to be the keeper of your memory. But in keeping that memory I got to burnish you to meet my own wants, in ways that I tried to when we were together but…” she then looks back at me, blinks, and asks, “why did you break up with me, when the Shinsengumi moved to the temple?”

I’m a bit taken aback. “I’m sure I explained that at the time,” I say. It was a long time ago, and I remember that I did so -nicely-, in that garden she liked so much. However … I suspect it was more important to her than it was to me. To me, it was getting out of something that was increasingly becoming burdensome, and I suppose I felt bad about letting her down. But to her… it was probably the heartbreak that defined her life for many years.

Yagi-san’s shoulders slump. “You know… what I did to Hajime I did to you. You paid attention to me, and I was attracted to the… idea of you, so… I took an interest in you. But… I didn’t try to know you, did I?”

It’s my turn to sigh. “Yagi-san… I didn’t want to be known,” I say, shaking my head. I was there to use my sword as Kondou-san asked, and to die, preferably in battle.

“Hajime did,” she says. “But I build something, and closed my eyes. You dragged me out into dangerous situations – you knew people would follow you, or that time you “ran into” Sakamoto Ryoma. But I told myself, I’m -good-. I’ll go out with you, be with you. I’ll be so good… you’d look at me one day and actually love me.”

I always thought… but here she is, just saying it. “Yagi-san -” All of this confession makes me uncomfortable! “I didn’t treat you very well, that’s true. But… you were mostly nice to have around. Like an onee-san!” Oh, that’s a nice thing to tell her. She was a great sister to her brothers, after all.

“But you didn’t want more than that, did you?” Her eyes seem to be looking somewhere else. “Then why did you… go along?”

I shrug. “It was easier. Everyone approved of it, and it -was- nice to have a friend… But you kept expecting things,” I frown. “Then that one time, at Asato-san’s clinic -“

She looks down at her hands, now clenched into fists. “Yes, that. Another thing I forced on you… but don’t worry, I’ve had to spend more time thinking about it and talking about it that it actually took.”

I sit back on the hard chair. “So why all of this, Yagi-san,” I ask, wearily. “All of this… recrimination. Going over the past. What do you want from me?” I sigh. “I can’t offer you absolution… I guess I forgive you?” I blink. I’m not sure for what, but I’ll say it if she wants.

She lifts her head. “Nothing, Souji. Just trying to understand it all for myself.” She looks away. “I… have to make some decisions.”

“Hide-san did tell me that you and Hajime-kun were having problems,” I say. But what does that have to do with me?

There’s a knock on the door behind Yagi-san. “One more minute, please?” she asks. I hear a muffled voice, but it looks like she got what she wanted. “I’m trying to… put the pieces that are me into order. Make some sense. Yes, Hajime and I are having problems. We -have- a lot of problems, over these long years. It’s because I… didn’t actually know him. I fell in love with my idea of him, and not the actuality of him. Years of misunderstandings, cross-purposes, all because of -that-. And now I’m beginning to understand what love is to him – and it’s not what I’ve been giving him.” She closes her eyes. “I’d rather be an adventuress who toyed with his heart for fun rather than what it is – that I stole a piece of his soul without ever understanding the value of it. That I didn’t -mean- to hurt him doesn’t excuse me – you told me that at Judgement, that intentions don’t matter.”

She then looks up at me. “It seems to be something I do.”

I’m flummoxed by all of this. “But Yagi-san… do you love him?” Hide-san made it sound like their usual sort of trouble, not actual… -troubles-.

She stands up, and smiles slightly. “I’d like to say that I do… but how can I say that, with the understanding I have now? What -right- do I have for forgiveness?” She shakes her head. “At least with you… I was, as you seem to indicate, an inconvenience that you could endure. With him, the hurt is real and I broke him because… he once actually loved me.”

With that, she takes her cane and turns to leave.

(OOC – Hide is leaving the jail. Shindou can stop her if he’s around, otherwise Hide will move on. Or Sano can engage Souji back in his cell. Understand that having Shindou know about the visit means that Saitou will probably know eventually, and that given this is a police situation, that eavesdropping may have happened.)