2024-08-05: .dear diary, the pain of my wife's absence is surely leina's faulT

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  • Cutscene: .dear diary, the pain of my wife's absence is surely leina's faulT
  • Cast: Yuliana Kafim
  • Where: The Silent Castle, Kaffeklubben Island
  • Date: 2024-08-05 (ICly 0099-08-03)
  • Summary: After she hangs up on Sayaka, Yuliana is left alone with her thoughts again. Her wife told her to sort them out, so of course she turns to her diary to try and make sense of what happened... but since she knows Elisa has access to her diary, too, her conclusions inevitably turn towards blaming Leina for Elisa's abuse. (CW: Domestic abuse)

"Hi, diary," the verbal entry which starts is clearly tearful, as the camera now captures Yuliana, dressed and made presentable as she sits on their loveseat. Her cheeks are damp, but she's... clearly trying to keep a hold on herself. "Something happened, I... I didn't tell Yaka. I didn't really tell her," she repeats, pressured. "I just -- I have to sort out my feelings -- on my own." Independently, that is. "I just have to talk about it. I won't tell anyone. I just have to talk about it," she repeats herself, again.

Who is she pleading for permission?

"Elya's been mad," Yuliana says, the statement choking in her throat. "She's been mad. She didn't tell me, didn't tell me at all, but I knew. I could feel it. I was upset, and she was mad, and that just made me more upset, and -- I thought I could keep it to myself. Leina," it's Leina, right now, "said such awful things. Such awful things! I thought I could just get over it -- and not upset my wife. I knew she'd be upset. She always hates it when other people treat me badly. When people treat me badly," she repeats, and it serves as a correction, too.

"I -- I'm getting ahead of myself," she says, she flinches, her frills wilting behind her ears. "I tried to get Leina to call me... three times, since she kept ignoring me. The last time, I realised maybe she had some reason to be busy, I tried to be nice... but that got her to call me, so I guess it worked anyway. She was still upset with me... and she kept talking about how I was, backsliding, whenever I went back to my wife. How Elya wanted that. It was so manipulative! And she still doesn't like our friends -- she was talking like Elya made me make peace with that Angelo and his cronies. She didn't make me do anything," Yuliana sulks, curling her arms around each other as her tentacles hold up her tablet.

"And she kept saying how... things were only good because I was doing what Elya wanted." Tears spring to her eyes, again. "Even said Elya was conditioning me. Rewarding the things she liked, punishing the things she didn't... she said Elya was convincing me to want what she wanted. Even though I told her she wasn't brainwashing me!" Yuliana shakes her head, viciously. "She said Elya was trying to make my anxiety worse! That she made me codependent! That she wants me to be focused on her displeasure! She kept bringing up those awful things, like after Ritechka ruined everything, and when I spent too long in Denver Colony... she said if Elya was doing even half of the things I said she did, I was, in an abusive relationship."

A sob wracks her, as she admits, in a strangled whisper: "I repeated those awful lies. I fought them for a long time, but at the end -- at the end -- I said that maybe it was a little abusive, sometimes. And I didn't even punish her for it, I -- I said I didn't want her to give up on me! I said she helped!" She's panicked, grasping her arms tightly, eyes squeezing tightly shut. "It wasn't -- entirely -- she was helpful with Salvacion. She -- she did say -- in between all these awful things -- she said how my gifts would blunt the trauma Salvacion was feeling, the intensity, and that would help her. She did help with that. But she said such awful things. Such awful things, and I... I couldn't put them out of my mind," Yuliana admits, trembling.

"I know she just wants to manipulate me," Yuliana insists. "She just wants me to be the person she wants me to be. But -- but she cares so much," she says, quietly. "She's always tried to help me. I guess she even helped make sure I got out of the Institute... I never knew. The... the truth is... those things, the bad times, I try to put them out of my mind because they're uncomfortable. I don't like thinking of how much I hurt my wife... but when Leina talks to me, she always talks about how it hurt me. I... I'm a selfish, self-centred person, so... I guess I let her say those things to try and get out of the blame."

She draws in a shuddering breath. "But I knew I'd said something awful," she says, just above a whisper. "It was too far to say it. Too far. Maybe it's fine for me to make her validate me, but I can't... say these things. If you say a lie often enough, it becomes true. And it's so easy to manipulate me. I shouldn't -- let her trick me into turning against my wife so easily!" Yuliana lifts a hand, to bury her face in it, the other still clutched about a belly all in knots. "I felt so guilty, I could scarcely leave Elya's side. I was all twisted up in knots... she got angry about it. It's not like what Leina said at all," she insists, shaking her head. "Elya never hung it over my head. She never even let on. But I knew! I knew. My bones knew."

The connection they share... doesn't just flow in one direction.

"I wanted her to take care of me," she admits, shamefully. "I wanted... I wanted her to be nice to me. I wanted everything to be normal, so I could just throw that whole conversation away... but I wasn't normal! I was all enraged, and then I ran out of energy so much I couldn't even wake up. It's after that that I told her... but she must have been upset I waited so long. She must have known I felt guilty. And then, I was so stupid, I kept defending Leina, even though I knew she'd said awful things! But even after Elya pointed it out, I kept doing it! Stupid!" She lashes out at herself, but quickly brings herself under control, folding her arms tightly over her chest again.

"Elya was always so fair about it," she sniffs. "She didn't make me choose, like Leina keeps trying to. She didn't even blame me for what Leina said... or ask me painful questions. But when I said -- when I said just what Leina thought -- about our marriage, she -- I mean, I was really upset. She saw that... she left me here to sort it out in my head. See -- see --" Tears spring to her eyes again, "even when I told her all those hurtful things, s-she's just thinking about what I want... wanting to be independent. I should have appreciated that more... I should have appreciated her more..."

She clutches herself tightly, neck twisted to press her head to her shoulder. "But I didn't want her to go," Yuliana chokes out. "I didn't really want her to go. I wanted her to embrace me, to stroke my back and, and forgive me... I wanted things to be good, but I ruined it. No... Leina ruined it for me!" She sobs, through her heated insistence. "Oh, I carried on for hours... I felt as if I'd been struck. I even struck myself, just to..." She trails off, panic painted over her tight grimace and her sharp inhale through one too many teeth. "Because of my terrible habits," she says, instead.

"But -- but I ate lunch," she says, eyes blinking open and staring, unfocused, at a point far from the camera. "I took my medicine. I was good. Guanyu asked if I was going to join everyone for lunch, but I... I just thought it would be safer... if I didn't." She falls silent, again, biting at her bottom lip. "I felt so, so awful, when I came out of the bathroom and realised she'd been in to tidy up and then gone. I don't know what I wanted... I just felt so wretchedly alone. Feeling that way, I shouldn't have rung Yaka, but... Elya said I shouldn't leave things undone," she adds, with a long, slow blink. "I decided... I'd just lie about my feelings. Since she wouldn't understand, anyway. It should have been easy... I used to do it all the time..."

Yuliana heaves a deep sigh, head lolling against the back of the couch. "It actually was, at first. Mostly. I hated how stilted my speech sounded. I kept using the same words... it all felt so obvious. But if I'd just been able to talk about Salvacion, it would've been fine... except Leina came up, and I couldn't hide how mad at her I was. Then she wanted to know why I hadn't asked Salvacion if she liked this idea -- as if I hadn't been glued to my wife the past few days -- and... and I said I hadn't been well, even though I said I was earlier, and she noticed that. But I didn't tell her, not really. I did -- I did say -- how inconsiderate I'd been this morning, how Elya gave me some space, how I was looking forward to the evening, dinner... but I heard myself, I heard myself and I hung up. I hung up. I didn't give her the chance to say anything bad. Not really." She sniffs, and adds, from her own warped perspective: "Really, Yaka was on Elya's side! She brought up how -- how it wasn't strange to spend a day away from one's wife -- how I'd done it to Elya so many times, and for even longer, when I'd stay in Japan. And she was right, of course... it's not like Elya was punishing me. It was a normal thing to do..."

She chokes, again, whimpering against lips tightly pressed together. "But that was just at noon," she says, crestfallen. "I... I don't know what's wrong with me... even in the middle of the afternoon, I keep crying out of nowhere. I miss my wife," she says, tearfully. "I feel so stupid. This -- this is what Leina wants for me, and -- and I'm a wreck, even after one day! Why would I ever want to leave my wife if my wife leaving feels like this?!" More tears fall down her cheeks, and she whines, "... it hurts so much. I messed up so bad. I just keep wishing Elya would come and get me... I don't know how to make it up to her. I..."

It seems like a different sentence, when anger enters her eyes. "I can't let Leina keep saying these awful things and just -- get away with it," she growls, though her lip still trembles. "She's annoying! If I just let her -- if I just let her -- no wonder my wife's so upset! She'll be sorry! She'll be sorry!" And it's so easy to blame her, to pour out all her feelings in entirely the wrong direction.

The diary entry captures more tears, as Yuliana sobs, after her angry outburst. But perhaps she's embarrassed by those tears... because soon enough, one of her tentacles sneaks around to hit the button that ends the entry.

It's better if she doesn't give voice to feeling a little bad for blaming Leina, this much.

It's better if she doesn't think about how... this feels like a punishment for something Elisa didn't like.

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