the thing is, i think kevin is a manipulative character, and i also think it’s one of the most interesting things about him. i mean, you would have to be, if you grew up unable to put even a wall between yourself and your sadistic, pseudo-incestuous brother/best friend/abuser/co-sufferer – someone who was volatile and prone to moments of extreme, unprovoked violence towards both you and the only other person you cared about. it didn’t matter whether it was kevin or jean that riko’s violence was directed at, kevin would be there to feel, watch or participate in it either way, witness to every new method of torture that riko inflicted on his perfect court.
forbidden and unwilling to leave riko’s side, i think kevin knew painfully well the influence his every word and action had on riko’s mood (and, consequently, on his and jean’s wellbeing). he also knew, though, that he was the best – perhaps the only – person able to tame riko’s ire, distracting him; pleading with him; catching a bad mood before it could fester. it didn’t always work (each time evidence of his own failure, he thought), but it was the only strategy for survival he had, and the only person riko cared about enough for it to mean anything. he spent 10 years perfecting the routine, watching riko’s every minute facial expression, every racket clutched too tight or locked slammed too hard, listening for that tell-tale dip in tone or hitch in his words that meant danger for them both.
anticipating what riko wanted before he even asked for it became a key tool in kevin’s arsenal, a way to manage riko’s violence and leverage the small bit of power he had in the nest. unable to express his own desires or agency, he learned to use riko’s wants against him, exploiting those things he knew mattered to riko – exy, his reputation, his status, his father, the master’s anger – to repackage kevin’s own desires: studying history, protecting jean, admiring the trojans, all justified through a carefully constructed raven framework that riko would accept.
it makes complete sense to me that kevin continues to use this survival strategy on other characters. he tells neil outright: ‘when you know what someone wants, it’s easy to manipulate them’ (p.339). jean echoes kevin’s willingness to exploit his desire in tsc, confessing that kevin knew he would ‘do anything’ for him and ‘used it against jean in the end, begging jean to distract riko’ while he made his escape (p.31). time and time again, kevin leverages what other characters want – kevin, for jean, a reason to live, for andrew, exy, for neil – to get them to do what he needs them to do: for jean to distract riko and allow him to escape, for andrew to play, for neil to do the kathy interview. all of which, ultimately, allows him to do what he really wants – which is to keep them all alive.
it’s this same logic that he inverses in keeping the knowledge of who his father is from wymack. kevin knows jean, neil, and andrew, he knows how to manipulate them and keep the ball in his court. he barely knows wymack, especially not when he turns up at his hotel room, and is terrified of him as a coach either way. kevin knows the power of the knowledge that he’s sitting on and has no idea how wymack will react to the information. he’s powerless as soon as wymack knows, with no way to anticipate or control his response, and no way to stop him from sending him back to tetsuji. even with a year of evidence to show him that wymack is a good person, as soon as his hand is forced in tkm to tell wymack the truth, kevin knows that he is at his mercy. it’s not a position he is eager to be in again.
by the end of the first series kevin has more freedom than he has ever had before, but i bet that he has never felt more powerless. the nest – cruel and power-driven as it was – gave him a clear way of understanding himself, his relationships with the people around him, and his place in the world. as that cage ebbs further away, and as those closest to him continue to heal and his sway over them continues to slacken, i really do worry that kevin is going to struggle more and more to exist in a world without the nest, the ravens, and riko
theartofmadeline
turnnoffyourmind
jacobvanloon
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