show me a hero and I'll write you a tragedy

(then I could remember to breathe)

See, you were a normal kid, with normal, unextraordinary dreams.  Sure, some of your classmates wanted to be JDF heroes, and some wanted to whaler captains, and some wanted to be rock stars, and you certainly weren’t the only kid that wanted to play in the big leagues.

The only remarkable thing was the fact that everyone thought you had a chance.

You remember those days, curled up on one end of the sofa while your father sipped Kirin, lazy and content and you’d talk about the shop or baseball or classes during commercial breaks.  (He was rarely straight-forward enough to tell you how proud he was, or how much he believed in you, but he never needed to, did he?  The way his eyes shone every time he said your name was enough.  When he mentioned his boy to a customer or to your friends.  When he handed you Shigure Kintoki.  It was always more than enough.)

That day, standing high above Namimori – the first and only time you ever cursed your luck and your fragile body, you’d known your life was over.  There had only been space for one great love inside you, and you’d never learned to say goodbye.  You’d never needed to before.

You’d never needed to accustom yourself to betrayal either, much less betrayal when the traitor was inside your bones.

It was never that you were melodramatic, only that you you simply couldn’t imagine a life without that love that you knew kept your heart beating.

And then there was Tsuna. Weird, scrawny, no-good Tsuna, wild and frightened and reaching out to you despite that, the strangest lifeline, glittering and golden in the sunlight.  It was a whole new feeling, just enough to give you pause, a moment to reconsider.  You weren’t familiar with this sort of gesture, either.  It was usually you with a hand outstretched – you’d simply never needed it.  You wondered, then, what it must be like to have a difficult life –

– and you knew the entire thing was laughable.  Bones break, hearts break, but only the most hopeless break with them.

Not people like Tsuna.

Not people, you decided, like you.