1. There Lived Three Clowns. 

"A long, long time ago, in a place far, far away from here... there lived three clowns."

The Red clown was the master of disguise; the Blue clown was the death-defying magician; and the Green clown was the enchanting acrobat.

Every day, every night, they would dance in their tent, and bring joy to the town.

-

"Rei-chan, Rei-chan!"

The boy turns around, and his little sister crashes into him with a hug. With a surprised yelp, they collapse into a heap on the ground.

"Ow..."

The girl laughs, sitting on her brother's stomach with her legs straddled around him. She grins cheekily, "Sae defeated Rei-chan again!"

Rei groans, rubbing the back of his head. No blood, all's fine. His hair is hopefully still brown (head injury would be disastrous,) but his school uniform is a little dirtier now.

"Well, nice try, Sae," he reaches up to poke his sister on the forehead, "but Rei-chan is immortal, so you have to keep trying."

Sae pouts at that, but Rei wraps an arm around her waist and slowly gets up, leading her to sit in his lap. They're still in the middle of the road, but they're right in front of their house, so he can probably afford to stay in that spot a little longer.

"Rei-chan, we're home."

Rei turns to see that the younger twin, Sui, is here too. She's much more soft spoken than her sister, and her smile is much meeker as well.

"We're home!" Sae echoes enthusiastically. "Hey, Rei-chan, today Sae caught this huge beetle in the forest, but then Sui--"

"Right, right, welcome home, both of you." Rei chides her, hefting her shoulders over his before lifting her up like a child under his arm. "Let's go inside the house first, okay?"

Rei gives Sui a glance, and Sui picks up Rei's bag in one arm to hug it to her chest. She takes Rei's free hand with hers, and they head into the house together.

The Ninomiya House is one without adults.

Dad is rarely around-- once a month, one every two? It's once in a blue moon, really-- usually, a nanny or a neighbourhood adult comes by to cook them a meal or three, but otherwise, Ninomiya Rei raises his younger sisters alone.

It wasn't a very assuring family situation, but they made it work.

-

"Ninomiya Rei, heading out!"

The boy runs forward, his path swerving a little elliptically-- before leaping backward in a slight spin. His spine curves right over the beam, and he cleanly crosses the high jump bar, landing on the mattress beyond it with ease.

"Alright, next one!" the teacher notes down a tick, and moves on to the next student.

Rei scoots off the bedding, dusting himself off briefly before heading back to his spot on the floor, joining the others that passed the test.

"Man, you suck at running, but you're really good at jumping, Rei."

Rei frowns confusedly at the taller boy beside him. "Takeshi, are you trying to compliment me while dissing me?"

Takeshi laughs warmly, "I guess I am!"

Rei tries very hard to look offended.

This was Yamamoto Takeshi, the most athletically inclined boy in their grade.

Rei can stand a chance against him in all the vaulting, stretching, and climbing events, but Takeshi excelled at quite literally everything else. That includes height, muscle mass, stamina, and every single ball game in existence.

So Rei retaliates, reaching up and grabbing up the taller boy's cheeks between his fingers, pinching as hard as he can, pulling in opposing directions.

Takeshi's smile never falters, and somehow, that's frustrating. In fact, the idiot seems to be enjoying the little vain bullying session, because it just didn't do anything.

Rei pouts, "I hate you."

Takeshi grins, "sure you do."

With a huff, Rei looks toward the girl's area, where they were lining up to get on the horizontal bar.

The crowd cheers in excitement as Sasagawa Kyoko steps up to the horizontal bar, lifting herself up.

In their grade— third grade, that is— Kyoko is definitely the cutest girl for her looks, and Takeshi is definitely the most popular guy, for his athletic prowess.

"She's amazing as usual, huh?" Takeshi says.

Rei hums, "I guess."

He'd always felt a little closer to these two than he ever felt for the rest of their classmates. Though Kyoko had only ever given him smiles and waves from a distance, Rei always thought that he knew her just a little more.

It's unsettling, sometimes.

-

"Sae, Sui, don't stand there!"

Rei scolds them, lifting the pan higher from the stove before his sisters could clamber up the stool he's standing on to get a closer look at its contents. They're about two heads below him in height, but he could never be too safe.

"It's dangerous, so go and set up the table while you're waiting."

"We already did it," Sui says, tugging at Rei's apron, "Sui wants to see."

"Sae wants to see it too!"

"You cannot," Rei says, holding off from dropping the meat into the wok of oil just yet, "do you want the oil to attack you?"

"We have the Rei-chan shield, so it's okay!"

Dryly, he admits, "the Rei-chan shield also wants to run away from the oil, actually..."

The Ninomiya Household is always lively.

Though their father is often away for long jobs, the three children live with little to no troubles in their daily lives. The neighbours take care of any adult-necessary chores and problems, and much of this neighbourhood boasts its friendly outlook.

Rei is nine years old, but that hasn't impeded him anyhow from being able to shoulder the burden of being the mother, father, and elder sibling to his two sisters.

In fact, it's only made him so much more eager to become the ideal older brother of the family. Though, some may admit, his maturity is a tad unusual for his age.

(Well, Namimori has never been quite the normal town.)

(After all, the Hibari live here. Surely, one more strange kid makes no difference.)

-

Rei wakes up at the crack of the dawn, and his hand reaches for his head immediately.

A migraine?

He tries not to think about it.

He lays back down with a sigh, closing his eyes and placing his arm above them as a weight. He reaches to his side, toward the table-- feeling around beside the alarm clock, as if something was supposed to be there.

(Where are her hair clips? The red and blue gemstones that always shone just a little when she woke up, because she always placed it right in the lane of the sunrise?)

(He. He, not she. How does a person mess up their own pronouns in their head?)

(This is ridiculous. Where are the pins? My brothers gave them to me, damnit.)

He sits up.

"...no," he whispers to himself, "no? I don't have brothers..."

He doesn't own hair pins either, much less the very specific bobby pins he's imagining perfectly in his head. Neither do his sisters, or anyone else he knows. Is he just thinking nonsense because he's half asleep?

(Why did it feel so wrong to not have it with him? Why does it unsettle him so much, like he's just lost something he was supposed to treasure with all his heart? He'd spent nine years without something like that.)

(...Huh? But he's only nine years old.)

His sleep-muddled haze draws his gaze toward his left wrist-- to the birthmark that encircled it like a thick wristband.

It fills him with conflict.

-

He forgets about it as the day goes on.

"Takeshi!" Rei lunges at the taller boy, looping an arm around his shoulder. He points at the school building, "race you to class!"

And Rei takes off running.

It takes Takeshi a surprised gape and a flustered regathering of himself before he's running too. "Wait, you got a head start! That's not fair!"

They chase each other to the school.

Rei maneuvers masterfully, stepping gracefully on the walls to lunge across ledges and fences along the road. He safely rolls over cars, and dances around the paws of kittens.

It's like nothing is ever in his way.

Meanwhile, Takeshi clumsily clambers over things, barely avoids rushing into traffic, has to apologize to the cats he kicked, and trips over the boxes in the alley. He's full of scratches and bruises in no time.

By the time they reach the school gates, they're breathing heavily but smiling brightly.

"Hehe, I win!" Rei raises his hands in a V. He's spotless, and Takeshi is a mess.

Takeshi chuckles in defeat, "man," he huffs, "how are you so good at that?"

Rei just grins in response.

"HEY!" a booming voice explodes from behind them, "Ninomiya! No vaulting over the school fence, how many times do I have to tell you?"

And Rei straightens in alarm. Swirling right back like a startled owl, he held up his hands in a fighting pose. "Oh, crap!"

Meanwhile, Takeshi beams, "good morning, Kuma... nosu-sensei!"

"Eek. It's Kuma-sensei."

Rei quickly ducked behind the taller boy as the teacher-- the keeper of the nurse's office, specifically-- marched forward almost confrontationally. Kuma-sensei stands before them, his doctor's coat over his shoulders as he frowns at the two before him.

"Good morning, Yamamoto. And my name is Kunomasu," he grounds out, almost miserable. "Ninomiya, you and I have a long overdue conversation about dangerous misconduct."

Rei sticks out a tongue in response. "Whatever, Kuma-sensei, bye!" and he shoots off in the direction of the classroom.

"Hey, NINOMIYA!" falls on deaf ears.

Takeshi laughs at the scene. "Well, guess we have to get to class. See ya, Kuma-sensei!"

-

-

-

And one day, the Red Clown said to the Green Clown-- "go outside the tent. We don't need you in our show today."

This made the Green Clown upset.

"Why? Tell me what I have done wrong," she demanded.

But the Red Clown and the Blue Clown did not tell her a thing.

-

-

-

The kids play around the park.

Takeshi is in that midst too, letting Sae chase him around. They laugh, and Sui desperately tries to catch up to them, not quite ready to be left behind.

Rei has always been one to tire easily, so he rests on the park bench, watching them with a fondness in his eyes. Seriously, how do they have so much energy?

It's not as if he wasn't an athletic sort-- Kuma-sensei had always told him he shouldn't strain himself beyond what his lungs could take.

Not that a child would know the importance of that.

Sometimes, he runs until he can't breathe, and other times he collapses in a heap. But it feels great to exert himself, and Takeshi agrees with that notion. Rei loves to run, even when he sucks at it. It feels great to do your best.

Something flies past his line of sight, and his hand reaches out before he thinks.

"A... scarf?"

It's a soft, black shawl, made of wool. Upon closer inspection-- it was blue-- navy, in the light. There's a crudy-looking bear stitched into the edge of it.

Rei looks around, trying to identify the owner-- and his eyes land on a man standing by the entrance of the park.

The man had brown hair and green eyes, just like himself. But his colours were a shade darker, and he wore a casual suit in contrast to Rei's school uniform.

Their eyes met, and the man's expressions softened into a smile.

"Uhm... is this yours?" Rei asks, standing up.

"Yes, thank you," he comes over, and retrieves the scarf, wrapping it around his neck in two clumsy loops. The man straightens, and looks toward the three chasing each other around the park. "It's very important to me."

Perhaps, he added that last line as an afterthought-- because it was a strange thing to tell a child you've never met before.

Rei couldn't help but stare at the man.

His skin was a very pale shade, and his eyes narrowed gently in a way that people would do when they were looking at something nostalgic.

"Your friends?" the man asks.

Rei nods, "yeah... and my sisters."

A chuckle. "Sisters, huh?" then he mutters something Rei can't quite make out. The man sets a hand on Rei's head, ruffling his hair in an almost fatherly way. "Well, if you're the big brother, you better take care of them, alright?"

A hint of annoyance flared up in Rei's chest— "obviously, I will," he declares, irritated that this random stranger would dare insinuate otherwise. "I'm the man of the family when dad isn't home, after all."

The man laughs at that. "Right, right. My bad," he removes his hand from Rei's head, and lets the hand come to rest on the scarf, adjusting it so it covers his neck fully. "Protect the family, live in peace and harmony forevermore, right?"

Rei squints at that. "Not that dramatic, though."

"You're one feisty kid," the man says, speaking in the tone of a fact rather than an encouragement. "Don't you have something you'd consider your happiness?"

Rei scowls. Seriously, who asks that? "Of course I do," he says. "Everyone's got happiness! Haven't you found yours, old man?"

There's a pause.

Then the man bursts into laughter. There's an offended mutter of 'I'm not old!' in between his chuckles, but it was too hard to really tell. Finally, the man sets a hand on Rei's head.

"Sorry, buddy. It's a dumb question, isn't it?" he says. "About as dumb as 'what's the meaning of life' or something. I guess only melancholic bastards like me really care."

"You just said a bad word," Rei chastises, regretting it a moment later because he belatedly realizes this man isn't one of his sisters.

Another chuckle later, the man straightens. Looking closely at the joyful scene before him, he closes his eyes and smiles. "You've got all this happiness in your hands-- so I'm sure you'll be fine," he says. "Don't become a deadbeat like me, alright?"

And then, he begins to walk away. Rei watches him leave, and lets himself stew on those words.

He never sees the man again.

(It's not until a long time later that he learns the man passed away from an illness, the same day of that conversation.)

-

"Rei-chan!"

There's a crumbling pain in his chest.

They had been playing tag-- just a little too long, running a little too far-- but it shouldn't have posed a problem. What's wrong with being a little too exhausted at your expense so your little sisters could continue laughing about how bad you are at running?

(He can't breathe.)

Clutching his chest he falls to his knees-- eyes wide-- ears ringing. He can't breathe. The air doesn't come-- doesn't pass-- doesn't give. He tries breathing through his mouth, but it stilts before it gets through his throat.

Black spots dance in his vision.

It hurts.

"Rei! Hey, can you-- Sae, stay here! I'll go call for help!"

He squeezes his eyes shut and tries not to make these pitiful whimpering noises, but they leave him anyway. He can't even focus on what people are saying. He can't determine whose hand is on his back and which of his sisters is in front of him-- crying.

Almost blissfully-- the darkness eats through his vision, and he doesn't quite know when his consciousness faded between the pangs of pain.

-

-

-

Overcome with sadness, the Green Clown ran away from the circus.

"They no longer need me," she thought, her face full of tears.

And in her despair, she fell into the river, and never surfaced again.