So she was back from the dead? She was still asking about his safety - Kubo touched her face back, grief and love and happiness all in conflict through his tears. She was back from the dead but she didn't remember that he'd made it home? He'd spoken to her from the spirit world -

"Yes," he landed on, realizing that was the important point to make just then. "Yes, I made it home. Two years ago. I'm fine."

'Fine' was a strange word to use when using it made him break down into a new round of compromised tears. Fine, but missing her every day. Fine, but always wondering in the back of his mind if he could have paid better attention, stopped his aunt from murdering his father, allowed his mother to have better last words than telling him to run for his life.

'Fine,' but never able to talk to anyone about the facts of their deaths, because his grandfather had become a kind old man who'd have been devastated to know what harm he'd done Kubo, what horrors he'd caused. Grandfather no longer deserved that pain, but some nights, the story had rested so heavy in Kubo's heart, with no one to tell it to.

'Fine,' but revisiting that story had been cathartic like ripping off a scab. The wound was a little smaller, but it bled all over again.

"I missed you," he settled on, when he'd controlled his round of tears again. He wiped his eye furiously. "I missed you so much."