Trusting my judgement
I'm not sure what it is about the bed before me, but it keeps me staring at it...
There's that thick flair of warm orange blanket, pushed aside to reveal a sad dark blue,
Bolsters were pushed out of the way too, not understanding the weight of dreams in Hanako's head.
Those dreams that kept her going, amidst heavy thoughts that no one else saw.
It showed though, if you looked hard enough, symbolism in black-and-white. Everything she said I recall perfectly;
Endless games of small innocent words, all subtly painting galleries of self-expression each time she spoke. And even now I still find more layers of double-meanings, each time I think back on even the most unimportant of things she said to me.
'Micro-expressions', body language. Heh, a cursory chuckle as my memory shows me Lilly pouting as I tried to describe Dr. Cal Lightman's genius to her. Conveniently leaving out the triggering event that inspired Dr. Lightman to slow down the video recordings of people talking, revealing almost unnoticeable cues that give away a person's true intentions.
Paul Ekman only takes it as far as detecting lies, but being a natural "truth wizard" myself, I push the ability to read people to the limits; as long as I spend enough time learning someone, internalising and analysing motivations and reactions, I "become" them. I almost feared when I started to "become" Hanako, and in turn, saw through her heart.
Of course I kept no secrets from Hanako, and while I didn't exactly tell that I was "studying" and "method-acting" her psyche, I did let enough truth slip by in disguise; I told her I like to pretend I'm other people (or characters), not to better manipulate people, not like Shizune, but to.. umm, err, .....write better fan-fictions. yeah. That must be it.
I don't exactly remember that moment when I suddenly "solved" Hanako-speak, but it must have felt like cracking the riddle of the Rosetta Stone, startling meanings hidden by everyday words that she very carefully chose, a horrendously hurt but very vibrant person smiling and telling jokes even when I couldn't see her lips stop quivering and no one laughs.
It wasn't something I would announce, or even acknowledge to myself, in the event that I was completely wrong in my analysis. But I held no reservations in imposing myself upon a more-and-more trusting Hanako. Sometimes, I think she even knew how plain she was to me that she didn't mind if I saw more of her scars.
In hindsight, I think I was driven more by the thought of holding her and calling her sweetheart, than to actually give enough of a damn to think of her as a person. I just saw her as a project, an enigma to figure out, a riddle, a game. For all my blueprinting of her mannerisms and motivations in my head, or even digging up those old records and newspapers reporting the fire and much of her early hospitalisation. I... I never really thought of her enough as a human being.
Yet my feelings for her were passionate, affectionate, ...desperate. I wanted her. I Needed her. The only one who would still trust me unquestioningly, even when she caught me stealing a piece of her past for my own selfish sinful sake. But she didn't mind. She let me have all her secrets, and gave me a beautiful honest smile to go with my shameful ugly guilt.
I let myself love her, and in doing so, I had found a mind far different than what I saw, a mind that would hold on to the tiniest slivers of happiness and never let go. No matter how vain and futile and foolish, she had wholeheartedly given up on learning to change and mature in facing life's twisting turns and harrowing hardships, rendering all her unpleasant experiences as excuses to deepen her obsession.
She had completely put her faith in me, so inconsequential it must have been of my betrayal of her trust, that she had indeed; Loved me. As more than a person, as more than a deity, but as a Constant, in her imperfect universe of under-funded orphanages and misunderstanding foster parents. Beside a blind angel named Lilly, I was the God who had finally found her.
I blame myself, I hate myself. I wanted to kill myself. In my obsession to understand her and be close to her, I had pushed her into thinking that she should never change, that no matter what she did; it didn't matter, I'll be there to help and protect her. She thought I had loved her for her beautiful scars, and not for the human that she was. She told herself she was ugly whenever she fended for herself, and being a helpless pet is what kept me and Lilly loving her.
After all, Lilly kept acting like she knew what's best, we seemed to know her through and through, and I definitely never stopped trying to make her my dependant. In the end, Hanako just equated us as eternal God and loving Angel forever there to keep her from harm, from the world outside. She had every right to have yelled at us and thrown us out of her life, but she was too kind to us... she kept us close, and rather than risk losing our love for her, she cried and destroyed herself, the real Hanako dying a little every time she dreamt of false happiness and tearfully slept feeling hopeless.
In the end, there was nothing left of her, but a scar.
A scar of a person.
It was my fault.
I gave the rest of my numbered days to help her, back to who she was before she knew me.
But she never changed, she stayed the same. A child, a daughter. A cripple dependant.
Lilly found it easier to agree that I was mistaken to have trusted my own judgement, than to admit she should have forced me to agree with her, and have stopped me in my heartless idiocy. She tried to help, but in the end, she just couldn't stand Hanako being so helplessly reliant on me anymore. She started to move away from us, eventually leaving Japan entirely for her family.
But Hanako doesn't seem to understand, she doesn't comprehend that Lilly isn't coming back, so she waved happily as Lilly took off with tears in her eyes, and mine too painfully dry to even cry anymore, for now I see clearly the Hanako that I wanted; someone who is no longer real, but truly; a cripple of scars.
