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you, thinking you're done with me and there are no more tears left to cry:
me, cracking my knuckles and pulling out two other books in the jatp fandom: iM noT dOnE wiTH yOU yET-
WAIT IF YOU ACTUALLY OPEN THIS, I MADE A LITTLE MEME I SAW OFF OF TUMBLR. SHOUTOUT TO THE OG CREATOR, IM SORRY I DONT REMEMBER WHERE IVE SEEN IT- (its is at the end :))
tw: mentions of death, feels and familiar topics. READ AT YOUR OWN RISKS ANGELS AND WELCOME BACK-
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𝗲𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻 𝗻𝗮𝗸𝗮𝗺𝘂𝗿𝗮'𝘀 𝗽𝗼𝘃
Ethan Nakamura didn't believe in miracles like his older sister did, especially when his own mindset seemed to test to that limit as phenomenon-after-phenomenon crashed into his rather simplistic life, like when his own mother signed his older sister up for adoption. His younger self was forced to grow up without her often as much as he originally liked, seeing her after school, or if he was lucky, during school to later sleep over at the Nakamura manor that night. Admittedly, he hated that his mother had given her away like she didn't belong in their home without a fight, despite that not being her intention.
He remembered that heated fight between their parents over the adoption, the blended words of hatred and regret, the voices increasing in volume that had made his hearing aids spike a piercing sound. He could remember his older sister gently pulling the devices from his ears to cup around his own, to block out the voices so he wouldn't be afraid and cry. That night was when he saw her light, how she privately promised him that she would be there to love him and take care of him, no matter how old he got.
She promised him to make up for lost time, to take him to all her favourite places and to protect him from all the ugly in the world when he couldn't bare it. Magnolia Grace promised her younger brother that she would stay, that she would become the older sister he was supposed to have.
So, you could only imagine the torment his mind buzzed through, the corner he had put himself into when she wasn't there, the pain and lonesome talks he had to put up after Dr. Lim had told him Magnolia could hear him. He had put it to the test himself, pushing himself to talk to the ghostly pale version of his older sister, the shell of her that was lifeless and cold, not the warm and crazy one he had grown to know. For the first time since her demise, he spoke...
Unknowingly being listened by her spirit, making up the other half of the conversation with her own tear-streaked face. He could hear the faintest bell of her, like static playing over in his hearing aid that had made him think that was really her, that the whisper was his Guardian Angel telling him that he needed to be strong.
To be strong for her.
The voice he spoke in was quiet and timid, one that was far from different from the person he knew today, telling her about his day and what he had seen. He promised her that first day that he was going to see the world for her, report back to her on every little thing until her mind painted the picture he was describing. Maybe that was why he adored photography so much, growing into the hobby in a way to show his sister the world when she couldn't see it for herself.
Every single time he saw her, he would leave a stack of photos by her bedside with each location scribbled in Sharpie on the back, hoping that they would one day see those places for themselves. To sneak out of their chaotic household on their darkest of days out at the dead of night, away from their screaming and petty arguments to the Beverly Hills Train Station, or maybe the Corner Cafe where milkshakes were two dollars for two, listening to the music from a little jukebox at the corner of the room.
He didn't realize how important those moments were, how she would drag him out to get fries at four in the morning, both armed with pepper spray and tasers in case some creep were to approach them. Some days, they would go grocery shopping at the nearest Walmart, or take a trip down to Los Feliz in a near-empty train car. He didn't want to do those kind of things alone, he didn't have the confidence to.
Ethan Nakamura knew the beauty of the night of the neon signs and the starry sky, how adrenaline pumped through their veins when they would pull their hoods up and scurry past police cars, giggling like maniacs as he tore down the streets of Beverly Hills on his sister's old bike, Magnolia wearing a pair of roller skates that he would have to hold onto her hand every time she fell over in the snack aisle of a gas station.
If he could go back in time to live in those memories, to remember the laughs they would share as a pair of siblings that needed to make up for their lose of time, that told the rules to go screw themselves. If he could go back to remember what it was like to no longer be alone, to no longer fear the fine line between life and death and choose to simply live, he would.
Ethan Robert Nakamura wanted to look his sister in the eyes and tell her he loved her, to stop her from going to the damned performance. As selfish as it sounded, he wished those nine months of fending his parents and the peering eyes of his high school off would disappear. He wanted to resume without the fear of missing anything.
The Nakamura boy had woken up with his eyes red and puffy, an array of lights dancing behind his eyelids as the morning sun creeped through the blinds of his bedroom. It made the room look a lot more lively, the dark green contrast of his bedroom walls seem as though it were out of a jungle, the number of guitars and posters hung up on his walls like fruit to the never ending seed of disaster. Unlike the rest of the Nakamura manor, his room was quite disorganized and frantic, like he was out of time to clean the mass of laundry that sat in its basket, or the collection of homework sitting on his desk.
Ethan groaned tiredly as he flipped over on his stomach, sneering under his breath at the bright sunshine that had touched his eyes as soon as he opened them. His eyes meeting with his phone on his nightstand, the device vibrating against the wood of it as messages flooded through his notifications. They were from a number of recipients, all addressing him in a way that made the normally sarcastic boy roll his eyes as students that had usually past him in the halls with a careless whisper message him upon the news of his dancer of a sister.
She was quite famous in the dance world, representing the Asian-American community through her chosen medium and standing out as one of the youngest. He was proud of her to find something that made her happy and busy, especially since it gave her the opportunity to drag him along to practices when their household became too toxic for their liking. Her adoring popularity--to which would tease her for, only for him to shut his mouth when she brought up that he had legitimately taken said ballet classes with her--had only seemed to bloom when her quote-on-quote hologram was introduced into the music community, despite many from school stating that her voice was probably tuned and broken in real life.
It had only made him scowl at his screen to see such gold-diggers in his notification, wishing him well and addressing his sister and himself as if they were close friends.
As far as he was concerned, he hated everybody with a couple of exceptions, so they weren't special.
He rubbed at his eyes as he flopped back onto his back, his slightly longer, black hair fanned away from his forehead, bringing his phone back into view to scroll through the number of wishes and prayers his classmates had sent. Each one he would cackle at, or maybe roll his eyes to. He managed to locate a few amongst the names he knew, his honey-eyes reading them line-by-line, not wanting to miss anything.
Kimberly Taylor (Do Not Respond)
hey ethan! i think u left me on seen last time i asked for the hw lol
seen 7:43 am
i hope ur well and that ur sister is, too! ik she was super important to you and i'm glad the rumours are true !
seen 7:44 am
Nic(k)ole Zhang
is it true? what's going on, e?
seen 7:44 am
don't leave me on read, you ass
seen 7:44 am
Elliot Hargreeves
message us when u can u idiot, nick will strangle me if you dont
seen 7:45 am
Julie Molina
hey, thanks for taking me with you yesterday! hope you don't get overwhelmed by the comments lmfao
seen 7:45 am
message me back when you can, k?
flynn says hi and hopes ur both doing well, and i do too.
don't let all the compliments get to your head, nakamura!
seen 7:45 am
Carrie Wilson
hey, e. i heard the news, how are you? i mean, stupid question, but i want an answer loser
seen 7:46 am
i know how you get, so don't be nervous and shit. you can do this.
let me know if you still want to talk or something, i'm here. and honestly, i need to talk to someone about nick thats NOT kayla, i'm here ethan.
see you, carrie x
seen 7:47 am
Ethan hadn't responded to any of the messages that morning, figuring he could always do it some point later in the day when he felt more up for it, not wanting to strike up a conversation over text. He shoved his phone into the pocket of his plaid green pyjama pants before rolling out of bed, ruffling the mass of raven-hair that stuck to his forehead with a free hand. The Nakamura boy had groggily felt around his nightstand, looking for the charging port of his hearing aids before slipping the devices on, lowering the volume to no longer listen to the screechy sound emitting from it.
As he adjusted the pieces to his liking, his eyes caught sight of the goldfish earrings that were exclusive to his older sister, placed on his bedside as if they were some sort of sign given to him. The pink sticky note taped to the back of a rectangular cardboard piece that held onto the two charms
With a tired yawn, Ethan had left the comfort of his bed to leave out the door just before he managed to shoulder the doorframe of his bedroom, making him grunt as he met no noise to the empty hallway of the Nakamura manor. It was always abnormally quiet during the mornings, the only sound emitting would be the obnoxious click of his mother's keyboard as she typed away to whoever client she were defending this time, or the occasional sizzle to a pan as his mother cooked breakfast.
Those were pretty rare in itself, since it was always him making breakfast for her.
The Nakamura boy had stopped short just at the entrance to his bedroom, pausing as one hand lazily rubbed at his one eye to stare at the door before his own. It had brought a frown to his face at the reminder of the empty room, where cold air only lived within it when the block of sunshine was far away. He stared at the crack of the door, letting in the slimmest of light into the hallway, a white room presenting itself almost as if it were a present.
Mustering up all the courage that he had, the Nakamura boy peered down the hallway in case his mother were to come down it, or his father were to storm back up the stairs to grab whatever he needed for his day, but it remained strangely mellow. With a soft inhale, Ethan crept towards the white door and carefully pushing it open as the creak of the door sounded eerily, the light nearly blinding him as he peeked into the crack of the door, a saddened smile touching his lips.
Behind the door was a bedroom no bigger than his own with pictures of a young girl and her family strung across the juniper-green walls that matched the colour of the number of plants strewn around the room. There were a few collections of posters in frames that surrounded the little desk pushed into the wall, able to recognize them easily as the animes she had watched with a tub of chocolate ice cream she would cry over. Her personality seemed to reflect off into her safe space with the few plants that collected by her window, drawn over by black-out curtains and her bed nearly made perfect with the exceptions of the few crinkles made into the Princess-type comforter.
Ethan had then looked at the ridge of the door, his finger barely tracing the graphite increminents embedded into the wood as a noise played off in his head, the memory of the younger version of the Nakamura siblings as they lined themselves up against the door and taking each other's measurements through a fit of giggles. He remembered that day when he had taken his sister's height that day, reigning over as the tallest sibling and stealing the bragging rights from right under her nose.
It had brought a dull smile to his lips at the memory, almost seeing the ghost of it before his very eyes as she trudged around that day with a playful glare on her face, the version of him smirking as he taunted his petite sister by purposely leaving her favourite mug on the top shelf. That seemed so far long ago, the dates on the wood stopping at the year of 2019 of December, the months after that no longer listed as the Nakamura boy couldn't find the will to continue it for the both of them.
With a cautionary leap of faith, Ethan entered the chilled room with his eyes meeting every little crevasse to every minor detail, his calculating gaze landing from the stuffed Froggy Prince that sat on her bed to the books and CD's she had sitting on her bookshelf, a Walkman and little figurines decorating the small space. He felt his feet brush against the faux-fur of her carpet, still relatively knew and plush just as the day she had bought it as he trudged into the room, his fingers dancing across the spines of books that sat on her shelf. It ranged from mangas to Biology textbooks she kept from the previous year, a singular pink notebook sitting plainly on her desk that held her scribbles of notes and doodles.
It was almost as if he had entered a haunted dream, forced to be taken back in time as he entered the room that was tailored to his older sister's tastes, remembering the day she had homed a bedroom in the Nakamura household after her frequent visits. He remembered himself and his father pushing the bedframe up that stairs, later the desk from IKEA as her dads pushed up the mattress. For a moment then, it felt as though they were a happy family as Magnolia carried a few boxes of her trinkets she collected up to her new room, bringing the bare minimum as her home still stayed with the Doran family.
There was a ghost of a smile playing on the Japanese boy's face as he passed his sister's Kimono that had hung at the back of her chair with a plastic protective coat enveloping the traditional wear, no doubt his grandmother's doing after she had visited last, wanting her to have something new to wear for the Summer Festival. He had his own Yukata sitting in his closet, waiting for the one fateful summer to when he would wear his to the Festival, knowing he didn't go this year when his own sister wouldn't.
His fingers ghosted over the plastic before he shuffled over to the corner of her desk, snatching the near-empty water bottle off of it and unscrewing it as he made his way over to the window. The blackout curtains pulled back to leat the stream of sunlight dance across the panel wood floors, a spare pair of her ballet pointes handing off of the curtain rod as the greenery surrounded the space.
Ethan took his time watering them through the peace and quiet that had enveloped the Nakamura manor, humming to himself the same way his sister would when taking care of her precious plant pets as if the sound were to make them grow faster. He had normally do this sort of chore every morning before he headed off the breakfast, figuring that Magnolia would've liked to come back home to her plants greener than ever, finding the serenity his sister had always found when doing simple and mundane tasks like this one.
At the beginning of the forceful tide hat had pulled his sister under, Ethan had always been afraid to step into this room, afraid he would run into her ghost, or ruin something of hers through their shared clumsy manners. He couldn't even consider peeking into her space and face the noise of those memories alone, to remember every last quirk and tick of annoyance that drove him insane until his grandmother had pushed open the room during the middle of June, bringing in a pink Kimono into the room, talking to the open space as if Magnolia were in the room with her.
He remembered peeking into the room cautiously with a frantic gaze, finding the older woman humming to herself a familiar tune she would sing to them, telling the space about her day as the tidied up the mess, almost as if she were talking to her spirit itself. Her eyes would look around the room with a special glint behind them before flickering over to the Nakamura boy, his eyes filled with panic that his facial expressions wouldn't portray.
The elderly woman had scolded him on keeping Magnolia waiting, dragging him into the room as she urged him to water her plants and talk to her ghost, unknowing of the spirit that followed her family, listening and contributing to their conversation. Ethan couldn't even fathom the idea, but instead listened to his grandmother go on-and-on about the market sales in Harajuku and the fashion they had as casual streetwear. It was awkward albeit, especially when Gracie Kimura and Andrew Nakamura had stumbled into the room to follow the noise, only to find the elderly Japanese woman talking into the wind and the Nakamura boy sitting on the floor, organizing her bookshelf.
Both Gracie Kimura and Ethan Nakamura had seemed to miss the glance both Andrew Nakamura and Ethan's grandmother threw at each other, a tilt of her signature Nakamura smile on her lips as they looked back at the empty space on Magnolia's dresser. Sure, neither Ethan, or his mother, found it strange to find their gazes locking of the picture frame that sat upon it that held the Japanese girl and her two dads after her first recital. Her eyes adorned with glittery eye-makeup and her body dressed in a glittery and loose tutu, her smile wide as her papa snapped a picture of the three whilst getting ice cream.
Though to their reality, something that neither Gracie or Ethan could see was who sat next to the simple photo, a grin beaming onto her lips as she watched her biological family come together in a way she had never seen before. She watched them bond over their mutual interest of keeping things neat and tidy, her grandmother's ears peaking at the sound of her granddaughter's voice as she piped in every now-and-then.
For the first time since her adoption, Magnolia looked over in her father's direction without an ounce of pettiness, hatred or anger, the poisonous feeling leaving her soul as she stared at the simple man. She saw the man that loved her mother more than anything, back then, she saw a man that loved his children enough to protect them from harm's way. Magnolia saw her father that did what he had to do for his family, she saw him.
She knew nothing could change the past, how he encouraged Gracie to put her up for adoption, or how he pushed to neglect both of his children, but she saw her father there for her. Her hatred for him only seeming to bloom into resentment as the man she had thought changed became someone who pushed people away, to an extent of no return as his own priorities shifted.
Magnolia didn't know it then, but maybe Willie wasn't her only Guardian Angel into this pit of Hell, maybe there was another.
Maybe that was why Gracie had stayed for so long, to put up with those arguments, petty retorts and late night hours because she saw him, again. She saw the man she fell in love with all those years ago, watching his gaze softening at the mere image of his daughter, the bad in him no longer outshining his good.
Ethan blinked from his thoughts, feeling an oncoming headache form at his temples much to his distaste, making the Japanese boy scrunch up his nose. Emptying the bottle into a pig planter that held her quote-on-quote cactus farm--he got it for her birthday as a joke, but Magnolia refused to part with it after he had given it to her--before crushing the bottle with his hands and taking it with him as he left. The Nakamura boy stayed by the door, throwing Magnolia's room one final glance with a tilt of his lips at the warm light that enveloped it.
His heart felt as though the chains that had held him down had lifted, like the world that sat upon his shoulders had finally weighed as though it were nothing, that his lungs were free to breathe. It was refreshing, to finally look at a haunting image of her and to finally see the good when his vision was clouded by his grief. He knew this wasn't the end of them, to say goodbye to their story when things finally felt good in his life.
And this time, he hoped she stayed home with him, even if it was just for a little while.
Ethan had carefully shut the door without much of a creak, nor the weight impacted against the floorboards groaning beneath him, afraid to disturb the peaceful sanctuary that was his sister's room. He looked behind him before wincing to himself at the light thud that had echoed throughout the manor, the door to Magnolia Grace's room now sealed off before anyone else were to come in.
With a sharp exhale of his nose, Ethan had parted from the hallway that housed the Nakamura sibling's room and strayed from the bathroom to groggily march down the staircase to the first floor of the house. The fireplace in their living room was snuffed out recently, the ash and cinders lingered from the firewood, leaving a hazing scent to waft around the house and out the chimney. His nose twitched at the smell, reminding him of the outdoor adventures his uncles--Magnolia's adoptive parents--would take them both out on, just hours away from California and into Forks.
It was rather gloomy over there, the skies never straying far from the miserable grey that painted the blue above, the sun hidden away from the mass of clouds, but it was rather reliable for a day or two of camping. It sort of reminded him of when he went to this camp on Staten Island, a name far from his mind as he went there when he was around the age of twelve.
Ethan tossed the crumpled up plastic water bottle between his hands as if he were throwing a softball between them, a reserved look on his face as his mind busied through hundreds-of-thousands of thoughts. The Nakamura boy never showed it, not when he knew he had to be the man of the family while his father was anywhere but home, but he had a lot on his plate that cycled through his nerves and worries that he never wanted to show his mother. He knew she had enough to bare when trying to get her first child back under her roof, to watch her collapse doing what she loved and to learn a whole new dialect to properly converse with her son.
But how long would he last crippling under the weight of the world to keep his mother from breaking down to her knees, begging mercy from the world as he perished because of it?
Ethan rolled his shoulders as his bare feet hit the wooden panels, shuffling towards the basket of slippers in the closet and slipping into a pair that matched his pyjamas. He had shoved the linen-lined basket back into the small space with his foot, shutting the door before he had walked down the hallway and swerving around the dining table, an elegant chandelier hanging just at the centre of it, six chairs surrounding the mahogany table.
His footsteps echoed around the house in a clacking sound as he shifted past the China cabinet that held his mother's glorified collection of plates and teacups from countries that had visited, each threaded with a beautiful, cultural design. Some were from a Japanese antique shop, a few teacups from Vietnam and another porcelain something from Spain. In total honesty, Ethan wasn't sure what that statue was--since neither Magnolia and himself were allowed to touch it--but it looked like a croaking rooster, the Japanese girl suggesting it was some ancient tea kettle from its vague shape.
The Japanese boy tapped on the glass that held his mother's prized possession, making a face at the screaming rooster before finding his steps echoing at a different octave, the sound slightly pulled and pitched as his slippers slapped the checkered tiles of the kitchen. His usual route towards the fridge was cut off, forcing the Nakamura boy to stop short at a distance away from it, his eyes shining with confusion as his eyebrows furrowed, his lips parting as he stared at the back of a man he knew.
Neither of the adults seemed to notice that their teenage son stood behind them, the boy confused to why his own father were home at this hour, knowing he was usually away during this time of day. He watched with his hearing aids spiking at the tone of their hushed voices, unable to find the words that formed from their lips without turning up the volume. They seemed to be in another heated argument, saving the peaceful atmosphere from their curses and spits of fire as his mother, with her glasses still sitting on the bridge of her nose as anger radiated off of her.
He almost expected steam to pour from her nose and fog them up with the hot air rooted deep within her, watching as she jutted her finger into her husband's chest.
Andrew Nakamura appeared physically annoyed with his wife's trials and words of logic, using the science and laws of things to shut down any other word he tried to voice. His hair was quite dishevelled as if he had rolled out of bed instead of styling it, the bored look behind his tawny-eyes fading into a look of persistence, hissing out his words in case Ethan were to hear them.
Unknown to them, Ethan had tilted his head and gave himself leverage at the tip of his toes--despite his height, nonetheless--to glance at the alluring pigment that sat hauntingly on the inside of his father's wrist, embedded into his skin and shining against the morning daylight of Beverly Hills.
It was about the size of his fist, the stamp round and dotted with intricate designs in a shining purple ink, glaring almost tauntingly to whoever dares to gaze into the pigmented symbol. However, Ethan's gaze had only grew more curious to find the tattoo, something that seemed so far from his father's own tastes, knowing that Andrew Nakamura didn't seem like the type to permanently ink his skin with something that seemed to have no meaning to his business, or his family. His eyes traced over the exposed skin, his white buttoned-up sleeves rolled up to his elbows, catching the mere glimpse of the designs come to life and forming three little letters that stood brightly against his ivory complexion.
HGC.
"Ethan! Your dad was just leaving, he's going to meet us up at the hospital." The Japanese woman gasped with a tender smile, one that stretched onto her cheeks in a hopeful manner that her son hadn't caught a single thing. Her voice piercing through the heightened tension had effectively caught Andrew Nakamura's whispered rampage, the fire that spit from his lips dying ot on his tongue to cinders and ash. "Is that okay with you?"
Both parents of the the Nakamura family had turned their attentions to the Japanese boy standing a good distance away from them, Andrew looking over his shoulder to catch his son's gaze quickly snapping away from the glittering stamp embedded to the inside of his wrist. His mind raced at a race horse's pace as he tried to recollect his mother's words, finding the words of 'hospital' and 'leaving' that gave him a vague image.
With his honey-eyes meeting his parents' intense gaze, almost silently testing him to understand whether or not he had caught much of the conversation. His mother looked afraid as her finger shakily pushed up the bridge of her glasses and pushed them upwards, a shaky smile playing on her pretty features. Andrew had simply stared at him with the same calculating gaze that he had owned, neither smiling in reassurance, nor frowning in distaste. He remained neutral on the situation, raising a single brow at his wife.
"Sure." Ethan stated simply with the same plain look on his face, one that scarily matched his father's as he started up the cold pot of coffee with a single touch of a button, the ringing and steaming noise filling up the awkward tension. He stared at the glass pot as if to avoid eye contact with either of them, uncomfortable in his own skin as he felt there gazes stick to the back of his messy bed-head. Unlike his sister, he was never good at getting the conversation to move along, much less than getting out of such a situation without muttering some dumb excuse.
"I'm going to pick up your grandmother from the airport, I'll see you soon." Andrew Nakamura grumbled in a quiet tone, one that was quite similar to Ethan's own type of speech without the tastes of sarcasm and self-deprecating jokes as he shuffled past his family awkwardly. His tone was quite lighter and careful than Ethan was used to, rather used to his voice filled his aggression or frustration as he talked to his business partners over the phone, or grumbled over the dumb things like how he had washed the dishes. It was surprising to hear that a man his size could talk so timidly, sort of expecting his own look of frustration to find his own son eavesdropping to the best of his ability on his family members, instead finding some look of avoidance.
He could feel Ethan's bewildered gaze stare at the back of his head, later feeling it trail over his arm and over the exposed skin of the inside of his wrist. Andrew inhaled sharply as he looked down at the stamp that had marked his skin in a glittery manner, a deep frown on his face as he looked back at his wife, who had plainly shaken her head, one that Ethan couldn't see as his eyes were looked onto the enticing, glittery mark on his father's skin.
Don't tell him, he isn't ready for the truth.
Without another word, the Nakamura man had roughly tugged at the sleeve of his skin-tight shirt to conceal the medallion of the stamp from his son's gaze, merely glancing over his shoulder to catch Ethan off-guard. The Nakamura boy stood his ground, his curiosity peaking as he opened his mouth to ask him his dire question, but he didn't get the chance to as Andrew Nakamura picked up his trench coat that was draped off of the back of an island chair beside his wife before placing a timid kiss on her head, grimly smiling to his son.
Ethan blinked with his mouth agape as if to publicly announce his concerns over his father's change in attitude, especially since he rarely smiled, nonetheless gave his mother a simple little kiss after a fight like theirs. It felt as though they were normal, that this was normal and that the years of silence he had suffered had been simply wiped clean from its tear stains and post-agony. All he could do was blink in response as he watched the shell of his father leave the room as he normally did, with powerful strides with an expensive suit jacket hanging off of his arm and the pricey watch sitting meticulously on his wrist.
"What the fu-" Ethan muttered under his breath with a pointed inhale, bizarre to the man's unnatural behaviour and wondered if tonight was some Blue Moon he was missing, that the normal was flipped on its head and treated with society's views of acceptability. Before he could properly swear to his own tone, he was promptly cut off by his mother's clearing throat, who rested unamused to her son's choice of language. It was no secret that he swore like a sailor, something he picked up in his early teenage years and a habit he could never drop in expression. "The fridge. Hungry."
Ethan had smiled lightheartedly as he signed the word over to his mother, using a blunt and obviously fake coverup to cover his own curse word before his mother would hear it, seeing her raise a brow at his choice of words before snorting, shaking her head at the boy. The Nakamura boy had deliberately clucked the fridge door open with tightened smile, finding all sorts of nutritional granola bars--something Gracie Kimura tried enforcing after she had found out both her children liked raiding the nearest diner for oil-cooked fries and cheese sliders--and a chicken his mother was defrosting for the grand meal they were supposedly having for tonight.
Of course, Ethan knew his grandmother wasn't much of a fan of American-style dishes when her tastebuds were accustomed to the exotic tastes of Japan, but it was always funny to watch his grandmother lecture his dad about not folding jiaozi correctly, or slapping his mother's hands away from the common American spices. Sure, Grandma Nakamura loved her Americanized grandchildren very much and didn't understand the appeal of greasy foods that come from the backs off of trucks, but she made sure to force feed her children with jiaozi and get them accustomed to Japanese game shows, or teaching them the arts of Japanese cuisine through firsthand experience.
Of course, both himself and Magnolia were her angels on the day-to-day basis and taught them everything she knew, which immediately made them both in-charge of reiterating their parents back into Japanese cuisine.
And Lord knows how hard she's tried to get her grandchildren into speaking Japanese, later scolding both Andrew and Gracie for not teaching them some of the basics growing up. I have to do everything myself, she would grumble under her breath while dragging both young Japanese children to the dining table.
Ethan had picked through the healthy alternatives before plucking out the nearly empty milk carton from the back of the fridge, there was just enough for him to drink from the carton itself and finish its contents with a few gulps, but he had to restrain himself. It wasn't midnight and he wasn't alone, so he had willed up every last bit of class he could gather from this God-awful morning and shuffled towards a cabinet to grab a ceramic shelf off of the shelf, then grabbing a tall, pick one that was relatively closer to his nose.
"Get dressed, we still have a package to deliver." Gracie Nakamura advised him with a mere glance at him, a playful smile touching the edge of her lips as soon as Ethan's gaze met her own, bring a pink blush to his ivory cheeks. She chuckled at her boy's embarrassment before she had flickered her gaze back to the scandling email to another client, her finger just above the trackpad of her laptop and hovering over the digital send button that would've sent her message towards her newest client.
Ethan had watched in the corner of his eye as he pumped some Nesquik chocolate syrup into his mug of milk, stirring it with a spoon before turning back to the coffeemaker to his right and the toaster to his left, catching the three pieces of bread onto a porcelain plate and sliding it across the island and towards his hard-at-work mother. He smiled slightly as she let out a relieved sigh before pulling her glasses from the bridge of her nose to rest against the dark granite of the table. Gracie had strolled over to the fireplace to where a picture of Magnolia Grace stood in her sophomore year glory, the bright pink dress and braces a mere reflect of the girl known to this very day.
She had rested the photo back onto the granite island as soon as she had strolled back in from the living room, smiling softly at the image of her daughter before she dragged the plate of bread towards it. She could feel Ethan reside next to her as he placed the cup of hot coffee by her side, his other hand holding his glass of chocolate milk. They toasted to the picture and sipped at their drinks gingerly, the last piece of toast left for Magnolia Grace, just as they've done everyday.
"Thank you, froggy." Gracie Kimura whispered with a light smile as she kissed her son's cheek, the boy leaning on his mother's shoulder as he bit into the buttered bread, something he had done quickly whilst his mother was out of the room to collect the frame. They hadn't exchanged much as soon as their breakfast was given, both quietly taking in the picture and the wonderful smile that beamed from Magnolia's face.
There was nothing left to say, everything they needed was soon coming back to them, just as karma would plan of it.
Ethan felt strange, like this wasn't supposed to happen and whatever had brought him to Julie's doorstep study was some type of hoax. Maybe some Romeo-and-Juliet type shit where he was Leonardo DiCaprio, except he wasn't white--and neither was Julie--and didn't drink poison. He had thought about what to say and exactly how he'd say it on the way to her house, muttering under his breath as his finger would fiddle with the purple dahlia between his fingers, knowing he would probably be ripping out his hair if he didn't.
WIth a quiet huff, Ethan was met face-to-face with the same fence gate that had tried to keep him off of the Molina property, where he had cornered the Puerto Rican girl about her quote-on-quote hologram band after that night at the Venue. It had been a long time since they had seen each other face-to-face since freshman year, that one fateful night rekindling that burning friendship that their guidance counselor, peers and therapist alike had encouraged greatly. Sure, he thought the forced friendship over shared trauma was stupid and insincere, but he didn't think that sort of friendship would bring him where he was now, to Julie Molina's doorstep to bring her to his most vulnerable state, to bring someone new and different to see the side of him that was softer and stayed hidden within the shadows from the people he cared for.
Digging through the pocket of his hands, he could feel the tips of his fingers brush against a cool metal wire, the same he had used to pick the lock the first time since he liked to keep his industrial lock picks at home. With a grin tilting at his lips, Ethan pulled out the bobby pin before shoving it into the lock, jiggling the makeshift key into it until he had felt the door's weight on the frame weaken, the slightest click making his ears perk up.
He shoved the door open with a gentle nudge of his shoulder, grinning at himself towards his own victory before he strided up the path towards the Molina girl's porch, putting the key back into his pocket before he wiped his hands nervously against the fabric of his pants.
"Oh, hey. Ethan, right?" A voice called out to him from behind, the oddly jolly tone to it making the Japanese boy freeze at recognition, a few steps short from the Molina girl's porch. With a grim expression falling through his handsome features as he quickly turned on his heel, hiding the singular dahlia from sight and behind his back. He threw Los Feliz's Golden Boy a tight smile, hiding the slight annoyance behind it as he jogged up to him, a bouquet of pink carnations in his arms. "What're you doing here?"
Fuck, I forgot to close the gate.
Ethan had known Nick from Mr. Wheeler's History Class and, of course, the famed Golden Boy of Los Feliz High School's Lacrosse. In all honesty, the Nakamura boy was quite surprised for the blond to even know his name, since they both relatively hung out in different crowds as Nick became a staple to Carrie's popularity and Ethan became relatively closed-off by the time he had attended the high school. They were two different people, the type to never cross paths as Nick would most likely gain a scholarship from his time as a lacrosse player, and Ethan would be relying on applications and extracurriculars.
By the bundle of pink carnations in the blond boy's hands, the unreadable spark that had glinted behind the blue of his eyes, it didn't take an idiot to figure out that Nick was here for Julie Molina, just as he was. Ethan could tell by the way his back straightened that he didn't expect him to be at her doorstep, either, nor dressed like some Japanese model with his fitted turtleneck and matching blazer. In all honesty, the Nakamura boy could tell Nick was quite intimidated by him by the frantic look in his eyes.
"Just, uh-" Ethan grumbled with a scratch to the back of his head, sniffling slightly at the abundance of pollen that had wafted from Nick's bouquet to his nose as he jutted his thumb to the door of the Molina household. He used his free hand to gesture to it with a lazy smile on his lips, wracking his brain to find a good reason to be here other than to invite Julie back to the Hospital with him. He could only deflate slightly, his own reasoning seemingly insignificant to what Nick would have to say to her. "I wanted to tell Julie that she was doing great the other night."
Ethan responded with a loose smile, his eyes casted over to the bouquet in the Golden Boy's hand, the thing big enough to attract a swarm of bees if he wanted to. They were a bright pink colour that he would've loved to photograph, especially since the fresh cut of carnations always looked lively before the hours to come. At the mention of the Molina girl, the Nakamura could only feel the smile dipping off of his handsome features to see Nick's eyes gleam like a young child at a candy store, a dreamy smile painted onto his lips.
"Yeah, she'd pretty great, huh?" Nick had responded with a loose smile on his lips, unable to hide his over-friendly smile and sparkle that he had kept behind the blue of his eyes. Ethan could notice his grip barely holding onto the towering bouquet of carnations as if his mind and body had been under a spell only a girl like Julie Molina could cast, forcing the Nakamura boy to feel slightly uncomfortable with the presence of the Golden Boy. Pursing his lips and rocking on his heels, Ethan blew air up towards the stray strand of hair that touched his forehead before nodding his head towards the elephant in the room, snapping the boy out of his daydream-like state.
"That's a big ass bouquet you got there." The Japanese boy noted obviously with a slight wrinkle to his nose, having the blond smile wordlessly at his statement, observing him as he looked at the bouquet with slight frown on his face. It was as if he were assessing them for himself, observing the quality and and vibrance through something as simple and beautiful like flowers. "I wouldn't get her carnations, those are the type of flowers I'd get for my sister."
If he could, Ethan Nakamura would've smacked the back of his own head if he could, knowing that either his mother or older sister would scold him for downplaying his own sentiment. He got Julie carnations, something Ethan and her dads would get Magnolia after every ballet recital, instead of dahlias which was something Julie adored. He could feel Magnolia scowl from here.
"Oh, seriously? I could change them-" Nick stressed with a noticeable frown touching his lips as he looked over at the baby pink carnations in his hand, the bouquet bigger than his own head. The Nakamura should've just stopped there, but he couldn't help but feel kinda bad for the blond, obviously trying his hardest to please the Puerto Rican girl through his simple and affectionate gestures. Although what he had wasn't much compared to what Nick had brought in favour of the Molina girl, he knew that he would rather give his chance to someone who would be grander in gesture despite his simple one.
He knew the more favourable gifts and actions were better than grand and empty ones, but he couldn't help but feel somewhat... insecure about what he had to offer. Sure, he might've had zeroes balanced on checks and a stressing habit of baking pastries and cakes at the dead of midnight, but he wasn't perfect Nick whatever-his-last-name is. He wasn't the star of the lacrosse team, or the goody-two-shoes Los Feliz has known.
Ethan liked to play loud music until he could feel that familiar tingle in his eardrums, to feel the rhythm beneath his fingertips and snarkily joke between classes with those who dared to hear him. He liked baking at the dead of midnight and watching the Power Rangers reruns on TV with his older sister 'til the point where they were fighting which ranger was the best. He didn't particularly like lacrosse, or any sport in general, but liked biking around Beverly Hills and building lego towers, occasionally plucking at the electric guitar his sister had gotten him after working at her favourite bubble tea shop for a few years.
Even if she was entitled to the Nakamura wealth, she liked working hard and knowing she had gotten him something to her own accords. He liked how they had that in common, where both Nakamura siblings would casually work at the arcade somedays to understand the working life. Although it wasn't granted that siblings could always work together, it made things a lot easier with a simple switch of a last name.
Ethan Nakamura wasn't Nick, he wasn't always good and he didn't take lacrosse as seriously as he did. He didn't join the music program to be close to anyone like Nick did, rather trying to find the music when his world went numb and soundless. He wasn't particularly popular, or the school's heartthrob with boyishly good looks and a over-friendly attitude, but he knew he would rather be himself--all snark, sarcasm and hilariously annoying--without the wall of kindness to shelter him.
He rather liked being liked by the people he knew, than liked by the general public.
"Here, just give me a second." Ethan muttered with a slight twist of a frown to his lips, swallowing his pride as he cautiously brought out the bright purple dahlia from the shadows of his back, letting the golden sunshine rain over the petals in a delicate manner. With a quick lick of his lips, Ethan tucked the flower into the bouquet without a second thought and hiding his disappointed glint with a grim smile. "I think she said something about dahlias. Now, you have one."
"Thanks, dude." Nick thanked him graciously with a smile returning back to his features, oblivious to why Ethan would be carrying something he knew Julie would like in the first place. He didn't have to think about it long though, taking Ethan as Julie's new friend through the whole fiasco with the Guidance Counsellor more than anything, missing the exact moment where Ethan just frowned with a nod. "How's your sister? I heard the news-"
The blue-eyed blond had looked up from the bright purple flower that stood out against the baby pink of the carnations that surrounded it, the grin on his face never faltering from the friendly one that he had given him. Ethan, however, didn't exactly want to indulge in this sort conversation with him, nonetheless someone he didn't know as well as he knew Elliot, Julie, or even Carrie and Kayla. The moment the Japanese boy's nose had flared ever so slightly, Nick somehow had known he had unintentionally struck a nerve within him, suddenly realizing it wasn't his place to peer into his personal life as he did.
Although the question had seemed rather harmless, Ethan had taken it as another wall of sympathy or some twist of gratitude, the twist of plains giving off the pros and cons that would've made his head spin if he had listened to them any longer. He didn't want that, he wanted everyone to mind their own business and stop worrying about him, or his family, or if they were handing out their titles of friendship to those who had merely bumped shoulders with him in the hall.
"Nothing that should concern you." Ethan muttered with a sharp tone to his voice, suddenly dropping interest in this conversation that had Nick blink in surprise, reverting from a friendlier tone to his usual one. He strained his throat to throw every last friendly manner within his body, giving a tightened and uncomfortable smile. "I'll see you at school, Nick."
Ethan shoved his hands into his pockets with a quiet huff, the corner of his eye touching the purple petals of the dahlia he had stuck into Nick's bouquet, worsening the scowl on his face as he passed Nick on the way out of the Molina property. He didn't stay long enough to see Nick's look of sympathy as he tried to apologize for something Ethan couldn't blame him for, rather just tired of people just asking him how he was, or how she was.
As stupid as it sounded, the Nakamura sort of felt bad for snapping at the blond, especially when all he was likely doing was to help, or in some weird way of condoning him in a way most haven't as soon as the news had spread like wildfire. It was weird to have the attention on him for a change, and he genuinely wondered if this was how Magnolia, Carry and Julie felt when they became the centre of attention in their respected performances. He was used to enjoying the presence of the people he liked, like Julie, or Elliot and Nicole, not the paper-thin faces of sympathy that reeked of sympathy gasoline.
He always hated the way they looked at him, as if they were expecting him to break like a twig under the weight of their foot, to puppeteer him into their ideals of grief. They wanted him to crawl and gravel in the dirt, to beg for the sweet relief of mercy when his throat had run dry.
It was pathetic how the expected him to act in a way that they saw fit, as if his habit of distancing himself from their piercing eyes.
With his consciousness trapped behind the metal bars of his mind and logic, Ethan had missed the man he had passed down the sidewalk, his hearing aids piercing at the clatter of a pair of black sunglasses hitting the ground, forcing the boy to stop to a halt. The Nakamura boy turned on his heels to stare down at the pair before looking up to see a man in a dramatic cape and suit in broad daylight, the deep velvet fabric of his three-piece suit contrasting against the white of his skin.
He seemed to not notice the noise of clatter, nor the black prop of sunglasses drop from his pocket as he had passed the Asian boy, having him pick up the pair before chasing after the man and his odd choice of clothing under the Californian sun. Ethan had called out to him, cupping his hand around his lips to catch his attention before running to meet him. It had weirded him out in the slightest as the man turned on his heel slowly, nearly dressing the same way as his father did through extravagant measures whenever he decided to leave his house.
"You dropped this." Ethan explained with a timid smile as he held out the pair of sunglasses for the man to take, standing a good distance away from him for safety precautions, his hand subconsciously going to the pocket of his blazer to feel for the small taser in his pocket. The man before him was quite pale with no touch of redness to his cheeks or nose, no visible sign of blood running through his veins. He had brown, nearly black tousled hair that was fixed to perfection, leaving no room for error as he examined the Japanese boy before him with his own calculating gaze.
They examined each other, almost reading off of one another as if they were sizing one another as a threat to them, the man with chilling blue-eyes trying to find the similarity to the young boy's face that sat on the tip of his tongue. He knew that face, the cheekbone structure and the strong jaw to the calculating gaze behind his tawny-eyes. It was right there, the names that connected to the face and the face to where it seemed insignificant to him, but not this time.
Caleb Covington knew who those eyes belonged to.
"Thank you." The mysterious man finally responded as his inspection came to a close, a grim and chilling smile touching the corner of his lips, holding out a gloved hand for the Nakamura boy to plop them into. As much as it bothered the ghost, the boy before him wasn't his priority, neither was his face so he had left it for now. Ethan had bitten into the inside of his cheek, cautiously putting the sunglasses back into the man's awaiting hand, quickly retracting it back to his side.
The man didn't seemed to be bothered by the Asian boy's behaviour, rather shelving it as if it were nothing before he put the accessory to mask the odd chill of his eyes just before Ethan could see a glimpse of them peering into the space behind him. Instead of saying anything, nonetheless, doing anything, he had simply turned back around and back on his merry way, throwing the Nakamura a chilling grin and an almost taunting wink, leaving the Nakamura boy a tad confused on the matter.
"No problem." Ethan responded quietly as he watched the man walk away, holding his his own hand by the fingertips before curling them, realizing they were cold to the touch. He shivered, remembering the mere touch of the stranger's gloved hand, how cold and lifeless it had felt without touching the skin of his palm. It was like cold air had brushed through his entire body, leaving him cold despite his warmer attire and the skin reigning its golden rays atop of his skin.
The Nakamura boy watched him walk away before turning on his own heel and straying farther away from the man dressed in exquisite purple fabrics, and farther away from Julie Molina's house, his heart no longer heavy but leaving his head filled with confusion. He tried to brush those thoughts away at the sight of his mother not too far from where he stood with the man moments ago, her lips parted and look of horrific surprise touching her beautiful features as her son jogged up to her just before he looked both ways before crossing.
"Well, how did it go? Did she like it?" Gracie Kimura had asked with a stretched smile as her eyes darted over him every now-and-then, nibbling at her bottom lip warily before looking back at her son at the notice of his lack of response. Ethan had looked almost deflated at the bittersweet memory, knowing he probably did the right thing in the end, but couldn't help but feel his own inhibition ebb away at his desire. The Japanese woman's face fell flat at his deep frown, her heart clenching at his saddened state before pulling him into her embrace, petting his hair as she's done hundreds of times before. "Oh, Ethan. It's alright, darling. Maybe, next time."
Ethan grumbled into her neck as his own arms looped around her, settling his chin to perch at his shoulder as he mentally battled with his consciousness, one part of him to go back to Julie's, and the other telling him to stay where he was. That side of him felt as though there was something ugly if he were to go back, something he couldn't understand and far from society's standards of reality. He knew he had to stay, to be right where he was despite the desire that lived within his heart to come back, but why did staying feel right?
Why did he have to stay away from Julie's house?
"I saw you picking her locked gate, your sister needs to stop teaching you these things." Gracie muttered into his hair before pulling away from their embrace with a pointed look on his face, the Japanese boy suddenly becoming shy at the realization. She shook her head softly at his timid smile at being caught in the act, gently pinching cheek as she cooed at him, finding the similarities between her children almost endearingly. "We're talking about this when we get back."
Ethan grinned as his mother pointed a stern finger at him over his actions, her face immediately giving away when a smile had followed over, one genuine and true that looked so similar to her children's crooked grin. She had ruffled his raven hair back into its precarious and messy state before gently pushing him to get back into the car, the Nakamura boy laughing under his breath as he followed his mother's wordless command, the bittersweet feeling that had once lived within his chest fluttering away and evolving into a glowing light of something... bright.
The word would sit at the tip of his tongue, but his mind wouldn't bother to chase it as his soul uplifted into a definition that the world simply wouldn't understand. He knew something better was coming, something amazing that would fill his abyss of dread and suffering and fill it with the stupid and the laughter. And he would be lying if he said he wasn't ready for it, to ready for the adventure and hell of chaos that awaited him, the both of them.
"C'mon, you know your uncles love their sukiyaki. It won't be good if its cold." Gracie Kimura grunted as she picked up the mounts of tupperware and bento boxes by the ribbon she had tied around them, lifting them carefully to be held by her youngest during the car ride. Ethan settled into his seat in the front, buckling up his seat belt before being greeted with the containers on his lap, carefully holding onto them to ensure they don't spill its delicious contents all over his mother's car. Just as his mother settled into her seat, buckling her own seat belt and putting the keys into the ignition, Ethan had managed to worm his fingers past the lid of a container, taking a small chunk of tofu from the nicely organized ensemble of food.
He popped the piece into his mouth quickly after catching his mother's agaped gaze, the Japanese woman just about to smack his hand away from the carefully prepared dishes with a slight curse under her voice, unintentionally mimicking the old Japanese woman that was Andrew Nakamura's mother. Ethan jumped away with a mutter of protest, clutching onto the dishes as if that alone were to shield him from his mother's wrath. As she shook her head, she muttered something about boys being boys and turned her attention back to gear that laid between them.
As the Nakamura boy settled the tupperware of food on into his lap, he couldn't help but peek back at the Molina girl's house with a slight frown onto his lips. As his mother started the car, Ethan could feel his eyes strain slightly before he blinked and rubbing away at the ache, only to stop at the sudden appearance of three boys in Julie's driveway. They all seemed to be sitting on the stone ledge of her fence, talking in hushed voices with massive grin's on each other's faces, one of the boy's waving in his direction almost tauntingly.
He wore a plaid button-up around his waist with a leather jacket bounded to his arms with a white shirt on his chest, his feet dangling off of the stone wall with an overjoyed wave, like he and his friends had been watching over him in some strange way. Another had slapped his arm, almost as if to tell the boy with slicked back hair like Johnny Castle to not interact with him, his hair blond with a fanny pack strapped across his chest and over a Whitney Houston sweater he wore beneath his faded grey jacket.
What made his blood run cold was when his honey-eyes met with a familiar hazel pair, the eyes belonging to a young man around his sister's age with tousled chestnut hair that was kept beneath the thick material of an orange beanie. He had a smile on his face as he chatted with his friends, his hands pressed against the stone as the three mirages of the boys seemed to be watching over him with polite and warm smiles, a sort of fondness to their eyes. It was as if they knew something he didn't, but weren't as nearly as clever as Ethan Nakamura was.
He had recognized those faces anywhere, easily finding them in a crowded room or down the busy streets of Sunset Boulevard, like a memory integrated into his brain for him to remember. Sure, he didn't know their names, or who they were, but he knew that boy with the chestnut hair and the nineties style to him, or the eyes that twinkled when he was with her. The fond, the love and the raw feeling of emotion he could easily spot when the ghost of a nineties boy looked at his older sister, the longing emotion standing out amongst the beautiful blend of harmony and intimacy.
It was like he was watching him for her, until she were to come back and grace their lives once more.
"Did you see that?" Ethan tested uneasily, his eyes nearly boggling out of his own head at the sight of the three ghosts of Julie Molina's quote-on-quote hologram band, one of four missing from the bunch. He remained hopeless as he hesitantly raised a hand to wave back to one of the more enthusiastic-looking boys, remembering the Puerto Rican girl's so-and-so lie of the three boys from Sweden. The boy with the plaid flannel wrapped around his waist let his smile drop slightly into a look of shock, as if the Nakamura boy wasn't supposed to see him.
"What's wrong, froggy?" His mother cooed his childhood nickname with a small tilt of her lips, trying to ease the tension that had thickened within the small space of the car. Gracie Nakamura could see his fingers pick at the rubber band that kept the tupperware in place, his eyes never leaving the empty space by the window, gazing into it as if a whole other world was presented to him.
If only she knew what he had seen.
"I thought I saw some guys in Julie's garage." Ethan confessed with a frown, watching the three ghosts on the other side of the road scramble like eggs on a skillet as the blond and the hazel-eyed boy followed their friends gaze. It seemed to shock them to their own cores to find the Nakamura's dead stare on them with his lips parted and eyebrows furrowed, his calculating gaze almost surreal and bizarre to see the boys from Sweden found hanging off of the wall of Julie's fence.
The Japanese woman grew concerned for her youngest as she noticed his lack of attention on the kiddy nickname she had given him at the prime age of three, brushing it off as if she had simply said his name. She knew that Ethan grew tired of it, whining as the title felt as though it had been permanently stamped onto his birth certificate. With a timid hand being placed on the Nakamura boy's shoulder, she looked out the same window with a concentrated frown, her own piercing gaze following his own, only to be met with the empty space of thin air.
"I don't see anything, Ethan." Gracie confessed with a deep frown on her face as she leaned in ever-so-slightly to put a hand to his forehead, the cool metal of her wedding ring touching his warm skin, forcing the Nakamura boy to flinch and pull his gaze from the wide-eyed boys that seemed to poof out of thin air as soon as he had looked back at his mother. Her voice was full of worry and slight stress in fear that her youngest may be catching a fever from the heat of the sun. "Are you feeling okay?"
With one last glance out of the window, Ethan turned back to his mother and nodded stiffly with a forced smile, one that was made to reassure her more than himself as he pulled her hand from his forehead. The Nakamura boy held it in his own, a way that relaxed his mother into a reluctant manner as she put her hands back onto the steering wheel after his mutters of reassurance of his health. She has asked him if he was alright once more, throwing her son a wary glance as she started up the ignition, which he responded with another tight-lipped smile and raising his hand to his mother's that gripped onto the wheel, gently squeezing it.
"Yeah, let's go." Ethan signed as his lips moved to form the words, his grip then returning to the plastic container that wafted the scent of pure Japanese home-cooked meals, something that had usually made his stomach grumble instead of the feeling of nausea building within him. The thoughts that ran through his head were redundant and confusing, making him want to puke and cry in frustration at the same time. Nothing added up, nothing made sense and the world seemed to throw more shit and flaming garbage than he could handle. He knew that curling up into a ball would do nothing to how he felt, maybe just relieving the tension that had built up in his chest, but nothing to sort the factory of thoughts his mind produced.
Something in him had told him that there was one person that tied the mystery into a pretty bow, the missing piece that solved a quarter of the bigger picture. He needed to calm his brain from the mystery, to force his ongoing headache down into a corner when he knew there was one person that could help him solve a mystery this big.
That, and he needed some Advil, and a hotdog, he was starving.
⋘ ──── ∗ ⋅◈⋅ ∗ ──── ⋙
word count: 11517
hi, uh- so i came back y'all.
i have delivered another offering because i'm that b i t c h and i've been lowkey swamped with so much hw, it's not even funny. i've been building this through the spare time i have had, and i wanted you guys to see it before i decide whether or not i should release a teaser for the book to come (y'know if and when jatp gets granted another season, netflix PLEASE) and i missed you guys!
it's been such a long time before i had come back to rattpad because of how busy i've been, and writing for Ethan was so weird since he was originally going to be a background character to magnolia's story, but i'm so happy to incorporate him into a bigger picture than just being the younger brother.
anyway, i hope to release this little teaser this friday (??) depending how much time i have on my hands and how much i want to work on other projects i have published and have yet to be completed. oh, and if you guys do read my little author notes, please leave your theories in the comments! i'd love to read what you guys think what would happen to our babes, y'know the maluke, juthan (idk yet) and the maggie willie kayla ethan concept i have yet to discover.
if you have read my previous works OUTSIDE of the jatp fandom, you would know that one of my recurring concepts/themes in my writing would be family, more than anything, so you can believe that's where most of my fics that i may or may not create in the future will be related to this sort of topic.
if you haven't read my message last chapter, it was a temporary goodbye to all my loves who fell in love with my characters and my writing, that we are coming back to each other when netflix allows it. thank you all so much for the laughs, the love and the tears as "magnolia" may or may not become a staple in your luke patterson simp journey, or might've been some sort of comfort for those who needed it. just know that magnolia and ethan will always be there for you, no matter how big or small you're feeling.
i've been getting comments saying that you love ethan and magnolia, or my concept of the original jatp characters and im so glad to hear that you love them just as much as i do, and thank you so much for letting me share them with you and following my story!
AND THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR 77.1K READS AND 3K VOTES- YOU GUYS ARE SWEETLY INSANE AND I LOVE YOU FOR IT.
NOT TO SHAMELESSLY SELF-PROMOTE MYSELF, but i do have other fics that involve the jatp fandom and others outside of it! they'll probably be updated soon, but like i said, its kinda hard to follow...
1.) xoxo, bratz - julie and the phantoms (initially, an AU to the maluke story because i love them and i want them to live in my headcanon universe)
2.) serendipity - charlie gillespie
3.) butterflies - carlos de vil
lmfao, that's all i'll recommend for now since i'm not sure if i'll be continuing any others haha. now, since you have scrolled to the bottom and i have no memes (I DONT HAVE TIME TO MAKE THEM,,, IM SORRY)
here's some fun facts that should've been in the book, but i scraped it entirely because im a people pleaser-
1.) ethan nakamura (a reference to the percy jackson series) was initially going to be twelve, but i liked dressing him up to look sophisticated so he's, like, sixteen now. he also wasn't meant to be julie's potential love interest, like at all... it just kinda... happened? it didn't effect the story too much tho, so it stayed as soon as it was suggested.
2.) magnolia was never supposed to know about her biological family, rather finding out about them in the potential second book, but i scraped the idea after magnolia's first encounter with ethan in chapter 12. giving her her birth family aspect to her life kind of dug a deeper depth into her reason of leaving whatever sPirit rEaLM/liMbO she was in and leaving luke and her boys behind :,)
3.) ethan wasn't supposed to represent the deaf community ONLY BECAUSE i'm not well-educated in the area, other than movies i have watched, but as i said, i am open to the idea of extending my knowledge to this topic, and so ethan being deaf was a way to connect with other readers as well
4.) willie and maggie were supposed to have some love-hate relationship where she hated him for bringing her to caleb, but i love willie too much to hurt him-
5.) the nakamura name was entirely based on ethan nakamura (pjo reference) because i'm not entirely accustomed to japanese surnames, despite the anime i watch lmfao.
6.) gracie kimura/nakamura was supposed to be the initial villain to magnolia's adoption, but i changed it to andrew for reasons that will be revealed in the second book.
7.) okay, so i prewrite the dialogue in my chapters to get a sense of direction, but most luke and maggie scenes where they're touching, or just hanging out, just come to mind while im writing, so most of those serotonin moments were added in last minute and unscripted (lmfao, IM NOT RUINING THE MAGIC, IM MAKING IT ROMANTIC)
8.) i like to think i combined ethan's personality with mai (avater: the last airbender), hiro hamada (big hero six), alec lightwood (shadowhunters) and either draco malfoy or hermione (harry potter) and magnolia's would definitely be peter parker (spiderman), prince zuko (avatar: the last airbender), carlos de vil or evie grimhilde (descendants) and a SPRINKLE of chat noir (miraculous ladybug).
9.) willie was gonna be magnolia's OLDER brother at first, or cousin at most, but i settle with best friend because i had a plan for willie and kayla to be siblings. legitimately, willie's supposed sister was SUPPOSED to be nicole zhang (magnolia and ethan's friend), but i thought kayla would be more of a fit (yes, it was last minute).
10.) "doran" which is magnolia's adoptive family name actually wasn't random and has a meaning to it. in hebrew, it means gift and in irish, it either means stranger or wanderer. i thought that was kinda cool since all magnolia did in her first few months in the spirit world was wander. truth be told that i was initially going for "spirit."
11.) i live for asian representation in media and film solely because its a race that is not as featured in many films other than being in its home country (i.e. China, Japan, Korea, etc.) so i brought it to wattpad. i feel somewhat unformattable when faceclaiming actresses/actors of different TYPE of asian when i know what they are, like kento yamazaki (ethan's faceclaim) is a japanese actor, just as nana komatsu is. so it didn't feel right to faceclaim lance lim (you might know him from nickelodeon's "school of rock") as a japanese male when he IS korean.
12.) "Andrew" (maggie's and ethan's dad) is actually a reference to my other book "butterflies-carlos de vil" since the name is used as that character's father, thus the contrast between fathering techniques. and ethan was an unintentional reference to that book to with "ethan" being a man who is quite elegant and up-tight. (this book was for korean faceclaims). tbh, i made these common characters unintentionally differ in personalities haha.
13.) magnolia HAS been arrested before for running away, to which is why she goes to that school for "troubled youth." i did put this into the story solely because i wanted her character to reach a depth my other oc's couldn't in terms of understanding why she did what she did, but that would be for the next book (this is gonna be fun lol)
14.) if it wasn't clear, magnolia's parents do have occupations that they do attend to like gracie being a lawyer, andrew is a businessman, anthony being a detective and mason being a stay-at-home dad (shoutout to my stay at home dads, i appreciate you). I hate the idea of stereotyping races and these communities, so i attempted to prep ideal jobs for them that accustomed to their personalities in a way (if that makes any sense).
15.) magnolia was actually supposed to be a figure skater, or a japanese traditional dancer (that's for the next book teehee) but i wasn't too familiar with the terms they used until AFTER i published the first few chapters of where magnolia had already been established as a ballet dancer.
***please let me know what else you guys were wondering, or what questions you have for me about this book... so from all my luke patterson simps to my magnolia and ethan stans, i'll see you guys next time and thank you for everything <3 we'll be here, waiting for the adventure to continue :)
i love you guys <3