There is a room in the Aoyagi household that Misaki Aoyagi does not enter.

When her Ritsuka was home, Misaki would listen to the sounds of her most adored (most Beloved) child at play up in his room, frequently rushing downstairs to see Seimei or his father or her. To ask them questions, to hug them, just to see them. So full of love.

Her Ritsuka.

This Ritsuka is not her Ritsuka. He is an impostor.

This Ritsuka does not play with toys or run downstairs just to see her, for her affection, for her love. This Ritsuka tiptoes around the house, stays out past curfew (something the real Ritsuka would never do) and when Misaki hugs him, he does not hug back, not like her Ritsuka. This Ritsuka hugs her back not with love but with wary tension thrumming in the muscles beneath her fingers. This is evidence enough that he is not her Ritsuka, but that impostor, that impostor who is stopping her Ritsuka from returning…

The rage descends as a red shroud over her vision and her hands are suddenly at his throat, squeezing…

This Ritsuka is void of love. Loveless.

Misaki never enters this impostor's room, because she knows that what she would see would only sicken her, sicken her to see this impostor try and fail to be Ritsuka.

It is several months after Seimei's death (and that is his fault too, she made sure to punish him) and Misaki becomes aware of something wrong in the house. It is very faint at first, barely noticeable, but it becomes stronger and more pervasive. More insidious.

The smell of tobacco.

It emanates from Ritsuka's room, that desolate, forbidden corner of the house she does not enter, like invisible gray cigarette smoke. Her husband does not smoke, and Seimei never did and never will (because he is coming back) and she does not entertain the idea that it may be Ritsuka himself for reasons she doesn't know.

Or maybe she does know. The smell is like a presence itself, a foreign presence that wants her Ritsuka. She doesn't know how she knows, she just does.

After weeks of steeling herself, Misaki walks up the stairs to that Ritsuka's room. She stares at the door for a moment before opening it.

The room is empty and neat and tidy. The window leading out to the balcony is wide open, the curtains swaying gently in the breeze.

A blue butterfly flits lazily in through the window and lands lightly on the back of that Ritsuka's chair. It flaps its wings once and settles. Its stillness suggests to Misaki an immovability that frightens her terribly, even though she could reach out now and crumple it in her hand, hurt it more easily than she hurts the small, frail boy who looks like and sounds like but is not her Ritsuka.

She slams the door and runs to her own room, locking the door, frantic, and does not calm down even when that Ritsuka comes home and knocks on her door, asking what is wrong.