Chapter 6 - Snowfall Signals Danger

Weeks had passed and Ichiro could now fully read and write. I was still thinking about how I change him for the better. There wasn't a plan I thought of yet that didn't potentially end in my death if he decided not to take the chance. I was tidying up and felt a chill. I looked towards the window and saw snow falling. I closed the window to keep the warmth in and turned to smile at Ichiro.

When I did, he looked scared. He was in the corner, hugging his knees. I knelt down next to him and rubbed his shoulder "Don't worry, It'll be fine."

I searched the house for warm clothing. I dressed in the ones that fit me and gave the rest of the clothing to him. He looked at them and shook his head. He began to wriggle and squirm so I grabbed the clothes and hastily dressed him in them.

I started dragging him outside. It was a challenge due to his strength but I managed in the end...somehow.

We began slowly making our way outside. I grabbed his hand and held it up into the air. Snow fell upon his hand. He looked down at it and smiled. He wrapped his arms around me, hugging me tight "Mikaela, you helped me so much. You've really changed me and I-". He stopped before he finished his sentence. His expression changed from one of joy to one of anger "You've changed me. So that's what you were trying to do this whole time. You just wanted to make me nicer so I would let you go."

I shook my head "It's not like that Ichiro. I wanted to change you because I thought you might care for me."

He grabbed my wrist and dragged me back to the room he kept me in. He threw me at the wall and proceeded to punch me all over my body. His fists sunk deep into my body, but it wasn't enough for him. He grabbed some chains and wrapped them around my wrists and legs tightly. He walked out of the room and when he came back, he held a sledgehammer. He came towards me and hit me in the head, only hard enough to daze me. He then swung the hammer back, getting ready for another blow. Before I knew it, I could only feel pain and agony. I screamed at the top of my voice.

My left ankle was broken.

He got ready for a second strike. This one hit my right ankle. Another scream came out of my mouth. This repeated with both my wrists. It hurt. Tears flooded down my cheeks. I didn't want to move. I could feel additional pain as I trembled. I lay there, my tears plopping on the floor like raindrops.

I felt myself go unconscious as it got harder to see.

I should have never tried to do that to him. After this, I should hate him. I should want to escape. But I love him still. I need him. But he's so far away.

After a while, I woke up. I had no idea how long I'd been out. Now and again, he'd come in to give me food but a lot of the time, I didn't touch it. I'd only eat it if I were really hungry. Coming back to find full trays of food always pissed him off. He'd try to ask me why I refused to eat but I stayed quiet. I rarely talked to him these days. It wasn't even the fact that it was a struggle to eat it because of my wrists, I just didn't want anything from him.

He walked in holding, not a tray of food, but a medical kit. He started to fix up my ankles and wrists with what the kit held. I still wasn't talking. He asked me questions that I didn't answer at all. He smirked and started kissing my neck and, to not only his surprise but to mine as well, I didn't react.

He growled, "Why do you always ignore me now?"

I looked down "I ignore you because I don't feel like talking to you. After I tried to make our lives maybe just a little happier, you got mad and broke my ankles and wrists with a sledgehammer. I can't handle your scorn. It hurts so much when the person you admire so much does something like that to you. Slapping some bandages on me won't help. Just doing this proves that your changing. So go ahead! Hit me, drag me, throw me! None of that will change the fact that you're starting to grow a heart and it's because of me!"

Ichiro looked down at me in shock. He thought for a second then knelt in front of me. He gently held the back of my head and put it into his chest. I could hear his heart beating rapidly. I looked up at him and I could see that his cheeks were red "This is what you do to me. I was just scared because I thought you were gonna break my heart. Then I realized that I might lose you so I wanted to see if I could fix what I had done. I'm so sorry."

With all the strength I could muster, I kissed him on the cheek and smiled. I could finally be happy. We could finally be happy. After years of torture from the world, we could smile instead of frown. Laugh instead of cry. We had no idea what the future held but we were there for the journey, not the destination. We still had a long way to go. We had a lot to discover about each other. I didn't know if I could solve the feud between him and his parents but I wanted to at least try. Maybe he could come back to school with me? I didn't care what we did but I was happy that he would finally be beside me. No. That I would finally have someone beside me.