A year ago, I declared August 11th to be Midori’s birthday and wrote a fic about it, therefore this year, I decided to draw something instead. I didn’t have much time or energy for it since I’m impossibly tired these days, so I chose to do a redraw of a piece from four years ago, a visual representation of a scene from Back to the Roots, one of the first fics @katkastrofa wrote for me
(I recommend turning your brightness all the way up for this one, looks rather grey otherwise)
In the dim light of the harbor and luminescent spirit vines, the wrinkles on her forehead create stark shadows, etching deep into her face. Her hair is pulled back into two pigtails, just like she used to wear it once.
Just like dad used to style it.
The implication stabs with a dull ache inside her heart - yet another proof that it’s not nearly as well protected as Suiren tries to convince herself of.
“They’re back. They’re alive,” her eyes are alight with pure, unadulterated joy, then gloss over with pleading when she doesn’t find a response in Suiren. Perhaps she is no longer able to feel such a thing.
“They will stay with us from now on,” Midori searches her face, waiting for her to smile and nod.
By all means, that’s what Suiren should do - reassure her little sister and not dampen her mood. In the past thirteen years, Midori had precious little good moments to light up over.
But to agree is an undoing in disguise, opening her up to more promises bound to break and to the pain of loss again.
“You don’t believe that, do you?” her face falls.
(Perhaps something happier would have been in order, but here we are regardless :P If by this time next year Kat and I finally finish coming up with Midori’s kids, I’ll make something featuring them, but we’ll see)
