There came another crash of thunder and then the rain began, sounding like a thousand fingers thrumming on the roof rather than mere drops of water. The window turned grey and refractive with a quick coating of liquid, and its light made the room seem to be sliding downwards in the pale haze of the Friday afternoon. There was not much else to have been suspected of any day in late July, and indeed, Ken was not startled he would have to cancel his mentor appointment once again due to inclement weather. And he had so been hoping today would be different...
Just then, there came a loud hissing moan from seemingly everywhere at once. The gentian in his hand snapped in two as his fingers reflexively clenched around it, and it's petals when flying as he whipped around.
To find only that the window had begun to hum with the sudden typhoon wind.
"Not again!" he complained to no one in particular as the noise continued. He couldn't be expected to work with such a row, could he? Perhaps he'd get used to it in a bit...
"Sorry, Omi," he sighed to the absent companion of his, as he snatched up a block of floral support foam from his work space, and began to cram it into the gaps along the window.
... or perhaps no.
No, he couldn't exactly claim he fancied monsoon season, or that he wasn't proud of his quick and sloppy fix. If the rain wasn't bad enough, he was in no mood to be bothered by the wind as well. Omi and Youji had left for the strangest of reasons that morning.
That was to say, they had given none at all. Simply packed up their weapons and vanished with a mere murmur about Nagi and Crawford.
Ken scratched his head and watched the headlights flicker against the wet pavement outside. It simply didn't make any sense... But how could is seem so still here in the middle of Tokyo, how could his thoughts be wandering erratically these past few days? It was only rain, it was only rain.
And that was his last gentian lying in a heap of green and white smears under his boot. The one he had crushed. Almost apologetically, he lifted his foot and stared at the ruined blossom, prone against the puddle of the window's light.
Even more apologetically, did he observe his arrangement, which now had a gaping hole in the left side. Sheepishly, he swept up the bloom and tapped it into the wastebasket, clapping twice and bowing after having done so.
"Well, if I turned this part to the back... perhaps then It'd be OK!"
He tried this and met with defeat. No one would ever mistake the side for the front. His experiments with cascading blooms by size had backfired.
"Oh goddamnit... I'll have to start all over."
With a grouchy, grim resolution, he stamped back to his place at the counter and went to place his fingers on one of the stems to start dissecting his work. His hands never made it within five inches of the arrangement. He just couldn't do it. "Oh get a hold of yourself, Ken! You're being ridiculous! Absurd! It's just one little bouquet!" His empathics were marked almost perfectly by lightning flickering above the neighboring shops. "C'mon! You're an assassin for crissake! Take the stupid..."
He trailed off not because of a particularly violent peel of thunder, but because he had glanced over to one of his companion's places and there noticed...
... a single white rose in with the red ones. "Hello..." It was a tiny, nubile pink thing, barely more than a miniature bud, but it was lying among Aya's usual crop of explosive crimson specimens.
"Forget why Omi and Youji ran off... what are you doing with that?" He asked his more enigmatic co-worker, who probably would have declined to answer, even if he had been present.
The white rose seemed to smirk at him, giggle even. Like a baby. "Well... you're a mistake, aren't you? A perfect little mistake. Aya's going to get rid of you after all..." But as his fingers brushed the stem and caught a single, tiny thorn he gulped, "... or he ordered you special and is going to kill me for taking you."
And yet, something just seemed to go together in the arrangement as he added her. The feather's of baby's breath tipped to the right feathery postures, the two irises seemed even more purple and the remaining gentians did not appear jealous at all. "Well, it won't even be the first time he threatened to kill me this week!"
Just then the door came flying open...
And a low, harsh voice muttered an exasperated curse. The wind roared in around the speaker's lanky figure as his rain moistened hands sought purchase on the clammy metal handle. The swirling gale was promptly shut out with an almighty wrench and a slam of the door. Aya glowered through the fogged glass at the swollen, near-black clouds, and then he turned around. Icy shards of violet took in the wind-rumpled room as he swept his sodden bangs away from his face with the back of his hand; crystalline beads dotted the whole of Aya's orange sweater. The frown he'd offered the sky still lingered when he settled the whole of his attention on Ken.
"No more deliveries today." Said because it was the truth...And because he wasn't about to go out in the rain again. If anyone called in with a last minute request, the other would have to go. He couldn't afford to get sick, in more ways than just in terms of money.
His eyes held questions, ones that wouldn't be uttered ever, more than likely. Aya glanced over at the two unoccupied workstations as he crossed over to his own, hands gathering the pullover's hem and lifting it over his head. He folded it neatly and lay it atop the end of his table, and untucked the tight black t-shirt he'd worn under it. The kind he wore under almost everything.
He bent to turn on the little space heater he kept under his table, and then checked the list at the end of his table. Two arrangements he had to make before tomorrow. Aya walked to the refrigerated cases and took out a bucket of ferns, limbs twitching in a violent shiver as he did so. The door fell closed with a soft slurp, clouds of frost fanning across the steamy glass. Aya set the ferns beside his stool and then sat himself down as well. The radiating heat felt so good against the legs of his dampened jeans, and he toed off his sneakers and lay his stockinged feet at its mercy.
A mound of long-stemmed, crimson lovelies lay before him, awaiting the touch of his skilled hands. But first, he had an important task to complete. An arrangement that hadn't been requested, but would have been appreciated he knew....If she were only awake to see it. She loved white flowers, and roses were her favorites, and Aya had ordered one. A perfect one, he'd specified. It would be surrounded by ferns and sprigs of lily of the valley, the vase tied with a pink bow...
Except...the snowy blossom was no longer there.
Slowly, Aya leveled his piercing, amethyst eyes at Ken.
"Where is it?"
Ken felt Aya's eyes rip through him like the frigid unforgiving hands of a wraith. His skin burned, his cold stomach seemed to fall out of his body. He lost all sense of his tongue, and everything below that seemed painfully numb.
"Where's what?" he asked. If he had managed to don his poker face, it was surely iced in place by now. Trying to look nonchalant, he stepped covertly between Aya and the flower arrangement. Would Aya fall for this absurd ploy? No...
Had he just called attention to the very spot he did not want Aya looking.
Certainly.
There was a chorus of angels in Ken's head then, heralding his impending doom with just one word, sung over and over and over again... "Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit! Shit!"
It was too late now... if the fearsome Abyssinian even suspected his blooms had been tampered with, there was no chance for forgiveness. Handing it over would be like returning a ravaged fiancée. Oh, I'm sorry I just raped this creature which is wonderful and perfect in every way. I didn't know she was yours, despite that she appeared on your doorstep.
Ken did then the what he found to be a last resort. He changed the subject. "Wow, man! You look really wasted. Damn Omi and Youji for staying away on such a rotten, awful day!" He found himself to sound more like a preschool book than anything. Maybe, if he managed to live through the next five seconds, he would have to lay off reading to his darling, precious students. "Can I... I uh... get you some hot tea?"
Motionless, Aya sat, his line of vision falling to some point across Ken's shoulder. His imouto's rose had been snatched away for some other woman's arrangement, and there it would sit, nestled amongst the fragrant jumble to wither and die -- more or less unnoticed. She would never know of the love with which it had been bought -- all for a girl who lay silent and still in a cold, clinical hospital room, the air of which was ripe with the smells of antiseptic and bleach. The gush of a respirator instead of the chime of her laughter.
No place at all for flowers.
No place at all for pretty young girls.
The urge to reclaim his property propelled Aya to his feet, to Ken's table. He would take it, yes, and he didn't give a damn if he destroyed Ken's handiwork in the process. Perhaps he would anyway...Or so his anger had driven him to think.
He pushed past Ken, shooting the younger man a withering glare, and reached for the vase...And then he stopped, hand hovering. And he looked -- really looked.
Instead of mere flowers, he saw beauty. Care. True artistic skill. The arrangement was perfectly balanced, for all its profusion of blooms, and despite Ken's one error.
Aya drew his hand back slowly and let it fall to his side. He couldn't destroy it, couldn't crush Ken's feelings like that; to do so would be a crime, he felt. He pensively regarded the pure white rose, reaching out again to lovingly trace its furled petals.
"Aa. I want some tea."
Relief fizzed over Ken like the suds of a most luxurious bubblebath. He sighed. He sighed harder than he had in years.
"Uh... yes! Right away! Hot oolong comin' up!" Ken saluted Aya stupidly and scurried off to the kitchen upstairs.
Yet somehow between the pulse of the rain and his sudden hoard of nagging thoughts, it seemed to take him an eternity to get there.
Aya always looks cold.
Aya always looks as cold as death incarnate.
Aya always looks...
He hit his forehead as hard as he could. The hall blurred for a second. Aya looked just how he always does... only... only... no! There was something not right about any of this! That Omi is gone so suddenly, that it's raining the white rose, that I'm... err... still breathing presently... erp. Something is not right at all!
Conspiracy theories cooked up by the most creative or stoned mystics had nothing in the fervor of work that began in Ken's mind. William of Occam had once said, "The simplest explanation is usually correct." In Ken's mind, warped by pent up creative fluids and soured to near madness sometimes by his work at Weiss, the old axiom was more or less backwards. The most freakish, convoluted explanation is usually correct.
And these events, related only by proximity in time, all had to fit together. At least, they did to him.
Youji and Omi.
The white rose.
He was still alive.
That look on Aya's face... the one that didn't quit fit, even the rainy day...
All this nagging at him like a shred of shrapnel sutchered in his skin.
"Now," he asked himself, quietly, as if some other object in his mind might overhear, or worse, Aya. "What do I KNOW for sure..." This being the foundation of any good detective novel. Ken wished he had a pipe, but only managed to turn up one of Youji's cigarettes. Pinching it was probably more dangerous than making off with the rose, but needless to say, he felt lucky.
Sadly, the cigarette tasted... well... very, very, very awful. Still he had stolen it and so he smoked it all the way down to the filter while the tea brewed.
"The rose... he knew the rose! He almost took it back... didn't he? That must be what he was after."
"D'uh Ken. Just... D'uh!"
"He was almost petting it there for a second when I booked it."
"Aya petting a rose, do you know how dumb that sounds?"
"I've heard dumber."
"Still... hmm... what does a rose mean..."
"Well..."
"You'd never figure them all out."
"Well... maybe. Only way I could figure it out would be to look it up."
And then, both voices united.
"I gotta get to the library."
Just then, the teapot began to whistle and startled form his reverie, he snatched it from the burner and poured it into the most traditional-looking cups he could find. He didn't figure Aya would settle for less. He arranged them on a tray with a bit of mochi and carried them down at once, one last consideration taking him.
I want to go now. How do I convince Aya to leave during open hours?
Well, that would require all his skill! Just like a mission.
Aya had returned to his chair by the time he reached him with the tea. "Here we are, just the thing for a cold day!" His lips said.
Commence operation: the Name of Aya's Rose! His many inner voices asserted.
Aya had broken off his daydream with an inward snarl, and had returned to his table without so much as a backwards longing look at the lost rose. He'd slipped then, he knew it, and worst of all someone had witnessed it. And after he'd worked so hard to maintain his Icy, uncaring persona around everyone, too.
He hadn't openly noted Ken's return to the shop, just continued to work. Deft hands had only begun to pluck the lushest looking ferns out of the bucket, and lay them inside the vases to let them feather over their milky-blue mouths. He would have ignored Ken completely if it weren't for the tea, so embarrassed and angry at himself he was. But the smell of it, the sight of the steam wisping from its surface beckoned to him like a siren. He lay the fern he held atop the pile of roses and reached for the cylindrical cup with cold, water-stained hands. It was just like the ones his mother owned. Aya'd seen the set on display in some shop window one night as they were driving home from a mission in his white, inconspicuous car, and had gone back to buy them the next day. It was a splurge, yes, but a minor one and rare. And worth it. He wanted to remember what had been.
He hoped he'd never forget.
He blew lightly at the frothing, white clouds and took a cautious sip of the golden liquid. It lightly burned his tongue, his throat, but he liked it; he was as cold on the inside as he looked on the outside that day. Aya carefully set the cup aside, it's delicate peach-smoke flavor lingering on his tongue, and idly wiggled his toes in front of the space heater.
"Arigatou, Ken."
Violet eyes darted in his direction and hovered there. Something was wrong...He could see it now. Ken looked like he was up to something, and Aya couldn't help but wonder what it was he was scheming.
But the overly bright gleam in Ken's eyes wasn't as disconcerting as the cloying, stale perfume that was wafting from him; such as the older boy hadn't noticed over the aroma of the tea. Aya sniffed delicately at the air. It was a familiar odor, but one he'd never associated with him before. It was more the scent of Koneko's resident creature of the night than its athlete. The redhead frowned disapprovingly.
"Have you been smoking?"
Ken decided lying at this point would, at best, be suicidal. "Yes... aw, c'mon!" Don't tell me you don't snitch one now and again. One won't hurt anything! Look, if you're pissed, I won't do it again, and if you think I reek, well, I'll go put on cologne until I stink of that, OK?"
Having said his piece, Ken tugged his chair over and flopped down right next to Aya. Well, at least as close as anyone would ever day sit to Aya, which was bordering on the three-foot space radius they maintained at all times when it came to their temperamental swordsman.
Well, he's gone back to his usual ultima thule chill, hasn't he.
Goddamn it.
Ken took a long gulp of his tea, and burned his tongue rather badly. He gave no sign of this save perhaps a momentary widening of his eyes... which doubtlessly was as noticeable as a volley of fireworks to Aya. After all, he had continued to fix him with his gaze... the slammed violet pits that came off clear as mirrors...
He can read me like a damn book... and he knows I know... I know he knew I was in Youji's lights... why did he even ask.
Why won't be please let me have one second to think of something...
In spite of this knot of tension that was growing more complex by the minute, Ken still wanted to go to the library... how to change the subject...?
That's the hard part. Aya loves books... or at least claims to. Damned if I'd ever sneak into his room to find out what he reads.
You might have to.
And then it hit him, "Look, I'm sorry Aya. Really I am. Saying the rain makes me a bastard won't excuse anything I know, but let's say I make it up to you... or you can just lecture me anyway."
'cause I know you want to...
Aya had remained unflinching on his stool through the whole of Ken's unexpected tirade, periodically lifting his teacup up from the one clean space on the table top to his mouth. Face a scowling mask, eyes gleaming hard as diamonds. His mind, though, whirled with questions. Thoughts. It struck him as funny how easily he could get him worked up. Be it a look, or a remark, Ken would react, would speak his mind without fear.
But then, he figured that the boy had never really been all that afraid of him. Had too much guts, Ken did, for him to ever really be afraid of anyone.
Aya fingered his jaw as if in memory of some old injury. And sometimes, Ken had gone a shade farther than merely speaking his mind.
Despite his firsthand knowledge of Ken's innate fearlessness, Aya had been surprised by his offer. It had been the last thing he'd ever expected to hear from his lips.
"Make it up to me?" One fine brow arched up in a show of curiosity. Now, that was an interesting prospect. Ken had never been so bold as to offer anything such as that before, had never even shown much interest in him period. Not that he'd noticed, at any rate.
Yes, it was an interesting prospect indeed.
Rubbing his chin with the back of his hand, Aya thoughtfully regarded the heap of lush, dream-scented roses on his table, then glanced through the rain-washed windows at the grey sodden world that lay beyond them. Silent and pondering. He loved to watch rain fall, really, but had to have a damn good reason to get out in it before he actually would do so.
And now, he'd unexpectedly found one.
He contemplatively fingered one of the uppermost blooms, sword callused tips skating over glossy thorns and crumpled leaves, then abruptly pushed away from the table. Work could definitely wait.
He tucked his dangling tails behind his ears as he bent to turn off the tiny, glowing heater at his feet. "All right," he replied, tossing Ken his pair of thick gardener's gloves, "put the roses in water and stick them back in the refrigerator case. I'll go get my coat." As he stood up to leave, Aya shot a glance at the still-damp, and no doubt clammy, sneakers that lay sprawled beside his stool, then he stalked towards the stairs, muttering, "And a pair of boots."
This is too easy... waiiiii! Go Ken! Go Ken! It's my birthday! It's my birthday!
Ken grinned, but just a touch, just a fragment of what he was feeling. "Sure thing! Say, let's go to the library! They've got that huge glass gallery with those leather chairs? You can see the whoooooooole city form there. And the place is bound to be deserted on a day like to-day! It'll be like we own it or somthin'!"
But then it hit him... he sounded a little too enthused about the books... Damnit! Well, I did say I wanted to make it up to HIM not sneak out on my own account.
What if he thinks I've been spyin' on him or something... that I know to much.
Well, we all kinda know he's a bookworm at heart. I mean, when does he drop that bloody glare besides when he's got his nose in "A Critique of Pure Reason" or something vaguely to that effect.
Ken did his best to hold in his hyperactive glee as he pulled on his gloves and began to tuck away the roses, one by one. He put them away in one of the display vases as if to give them not only fantastic floral bodies to show off, but what could be regarded as fantastic floral garb. All the while, we watched the stairs with the utmost care, wanting to look calm and dignified as soon as Aya came back into view. Once the roses were safe, he flipped the sign on the door to "closed", switched off most of the lights and left a heap of post-it notes all about the room for the other two members of Weiss, should they suddenly re-appear. Don't clean the teacup, I will. Aya's roses -- leave alone if you value your life. At his own arrangement -- Cute, huh ^^? There were several, all in many interesting places, such as the bathroom mirror and Youji's cigarette case which read -- Gone to Library. Back soon. He figured they had to find one, sooner or later.
Sadly, Aya found him attaching the last one to the pot of one of Omi's freesias... so much for trying to pass off the occasional flurries of post-its as their youngest member's folly.
Ken just smiled, pulled on his jacket, and held the door wide open for his companion. He opened it before Aya even had his boots on, and got what could be construed as more than the usual frown as a few cups of water found their way onto the nice, clean floor. "After you," his insisted and ended up almost slamming the door once Aya was out, as if to keep him form running back inside.
It was not too cold outside, but the wetness made it seem so. The deluge had tapered off somewhat to more of a shower, but an insistent, billowing one which was always rolling back and forth in the wind. Ken could feel his ears start to chill unpleasantly. The swordsman's demeanor failed to change. If anything, it only looked more appropriate, out here in the gloomy weather. And yet the red of Aya's hair seemed more brilliant, and his eyes truest violet.
This man looked as if he belonged with the rain as much as the clouds... and yet lost.
Ken sighed, and pulled the cover off his bike. "If you've got a hood, you'd better pull it up..." And with that, jammed the key in the ignition and fired the monster up. The radio came on, quite loudly, even beneath the erratic patter of the raindrops...
She follows me down to the sound of the sea
Slips through the sand and stares up at me
Is this how it happens?
Is this how it feels?
Is this how a star falls?
Is this how a star falls?
The night turns as I try to explain
Irresistible attraction and orbital plane
Maybe it's more like a moth to a flame
She pushes my face with her smile
Forget about stars for a while!
She melts
Ken beckoned to Aya, and tried very hard not to sing.
The lisping rain changed direction at the whim of the wind. It tickled the back of his bare neck, whispered at his ears. Starred his lashes and crimson hair. He felt the damp sinking into those bits of his shirt that the coat left exposed, felt it wetting the legs of his jeans. His feet, now encased in well-worn black leather, were most noticeably chilled.
In other words, Aya was miserable. And very afraid.
The bike frightened him.
He'd never been on it before. Had never liked to watch Ken ride off on it. Had always sat up at night in his room and waited for him to return when he did go out on it--no matter how late the hour. It wasn't until he heard the bouncing slap of oft-sneakered feet upon the hardwood that he would roll over under the safe cocoon of his blankets and go to sleep.
After all, people were killed in motorcycle accidents nearly everyday. Killed or left in limbo.
Just like she had been.
In the end, it had been his reason that had persuaded him. He was the leader; it wouldn't do for Ken to see how unnerved he was. It wouldn't do for his pride.
The library was his absolute favorite place to go; Every off day he had from the shop would be ended with a visit there. Perfect place to venture on a rainy day.
And, also, he was growing colder temperature-wise, something he absolutely hated. And Aya had the idea that being so close in proximity to Ken would be enough to warm him.
And that last was the real temptation.
With a glare to cover his fear and a deep, quiet breath to steady himself, Aya swung a long leg over the seat and settled himself on the bike behind Ken. Pale hands clutched at broad shoulders. He caught sight of the undulating, rainbow-swirl of colors in a large, rain-and-oil puddle on the street by the back tire.
Then he ducked his head down a little and closed his eyes.
His voice came out in a strained near-whisper. "Let's go."
Meanwhile millions of miles away in space
An incoming comet crashes Jupiter's face
And disappears away with barely a trace
Was that it?
Was that the Jupiter show?
Kinda wasn't quite what I hoped for, you know?
Pulling away, she stands up slow
Around her the night turns
Around her the night turns
Ken's urge to sing was about to rise past his lips and go spilling dissonantly into the besotted air on his mediocre singing voice. Some songs just did that to him, almost choked him with their words...
What stopped him was the sensation of Aya's hands on his shoulder. He might have been a fool, but he had had enough people behind him to know what one felt like when they were frightened. And his companion was scared out of his wits. This realization stunned Ken at first.
He can't be... he just can't be... that's soooooo not Aya!
But the tenseness of the lithe fingers, the awkward posture of the body behind him. None of these lied. And then he too felt a sort of fear, a darkening at least of his spirit.
This is about as honest as Aya's ever been with me... or anyone that I know.
And he doesn't even realize it. That I can tell how he feels.
The clouds overhead decided to play coy and rolled atop one another into a blue-grey darkness more akin to evening than an afternoon. His face was cold and fell. If this would have been a friend like he had had once before, he would have petted Aya's hands and swept them onto his waist with a few gentle words. If this had been anyone he'd once known in the J-league, he would have joked until he lightened up. If this had been the soft hands with the wine glass...
Ken realized he had been stopped at the corner for many moments, but knew not how many. Well, waiting would make it worse. He knew that. But as for any other action he might take, that was another matter.
He kicked off as gently as he could and pulled into traffic at just a bit below the wet speed limit. No use in making the ride shorter by zigzagging between taxis and toyotas at break-neck speed. The music he turned up just a touch to try to drown out the whine of the engine. It very well might have been that The Cure was not Aya's taste, but any noise was better than that which was the object of one's fear.
Didn't Persia train him on one of these things? He should have...
Well, maybe he didn't, because he's afraid of them.
But... why?
He made up his mind and broke the silence as they sat before the gleaming eye of a red light. "Might not wanna hang onto my jacket there. Leather gets kinda slippy when it's wet after all. If you don't mind of course, that's Ok. But looping your arms with mine or putting them around my waist is probably a little safer..."
His tongue felt think and sloppy on those words. Trying not to sound sorry for Aya, even though he was.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that was it
That was the Jupiter Crash
Drawn too close and gone in a flash
Just a few bruises in the region of the splash
She moved to the sound of the sea
She drifted away from me
So much for gravity
Aya'd had no idea where they were exactly, only that they had stopped. The machine hummed and vibrated under him like a live thing, like it was in control of him and not the other way around. He suspected that it was. Aya so despised not being in control.
Fear was a knot around his heart, solid and real and tense. His hands had gone numb atop their perch on Ken's shoulders, both from the lulling watery chill and the desperate hold he had on them.
He tried to relax, forced himself to hear the song that was cascading from the speaker in an effort to accomplish that Herculean feat. English words wrapped in a cushion of curiously heartening, jangling sound. He concentrated on them, to catch the drift of them. The knot gave way...Not much, but enough to allow him to open his eyes.
The coffee-shop that he often frequented stood just opposite them. He could smell then the hint of rich, dark roast and pastries in the air, underscored as it was by the smell of oil and gas. The trees were swaying completely out of time with the music. The asphalt glittered with wet. Puddles dotted it. One wrong move, and they could --
No! Damn it! I won't think of it!
He clutched at Ken again, seeking reassurance. Eyes once more screwed shut. And then, his companion was speaking. A purr of Japanese over the lilt of English. Aya opened his eyes again, found himself staring at the back of his neck. Dark hair just brushing the collar of his jacket. Thick and soft at the look of it.
And he got angry. Not so much at Ken as at himself. He'd slipped again, and now it had been noticed. He cursed himself inwardly for his weakness.
"I'm fine," he ground out. Hands gathered the buttery smooth skin in his slick palms. He was going to do as he wished. Ken would not see him crumble...
But then, just as the light changed, Aya had an image of himself all broken angles and bleeding on the street, and his resolve fled away from him like a startled bird. He released his hold with considerable effort, only to snatch at him again. Arms around Ken's waist and quaking hands clasping wrists. He wanted to bury his face in the curve of Ken's shoulder and blot out the world.
Aya settled for closing his eyes.
"Whatever," he muttered.
This had been the longest red light of Ken's life. As Jupiter Crash wound down to a close, he'd been sure his few small words had somehow managed to spook Aya even more than the bike apparently had. He'd said them in slow motion, watched their surroundings skim freezing and nearly still, waiting. Trying not to watch. What did his companion look like curled against him on his bike? He felt at least like he was the only warm thing in the world. And then the glint on his own goggles had turned to green and he's made their motion begin as delicately as he could.
But then there was a split second of emptiness.
What the...
Followed by two arms clenched tightly about his waist. The whole manner of their touch was utterly ingenuous. He swore he felt them shudder around him for a moment and glanced down. Aya's arms were set about him as a child might have placed them. The knuckles were white. The muscles set rigidly. Anyone else and he would have laughed a little, or at least smiled. Maybe reached around and patted their head. But this was Aya... AYA!
And though the dark river of the road remained clear before him, Ken's mind elsewhere tumbled. Some eerie familiarity. A little wisp of déjà vu that curled itself around his shoulders, settled in and batted away the raindrops so he could no longer feel them. For a moment Aya was gone to, and the hands in place of his were creeping into Ken's shirt.
"What's this action."
"I'm just playing."
"Sure..." and then he'd take those hands, caress the fingers inside out. "Gotcha I..."
No... It's Aya. It's Aya. It's just Aya!
But that only made the presence behind him even more defined.
The only sigh he left himself indulge in was the one after they arrived at the library. The parking lot was bare and empty as a black glass desert, the lobby silent like a catacomb despite the ciphers of light that glossed over blue form the clouds came in faint as spectres upon the floor. Ken stood dripping in the entry way a moment, rubbing at his eyes as if his hands would scare away the visions that now unbidden came, one by one, from the fog of the day.
He sneezed. Gave up. Hung his coat and turned to make sure Aya had followed him.
The first thing that struck Aya upon stepping through the wide, double glass doors was how quiet it was. Deathly so. Like they were the only two people left alive in Tokyo. It felt like a movie.
And then, a sneeze.
It was an ominous sound to Aya's ears, and he leveled the whole of his attention upon his comrade. Ken was sick, he just knew it. He wouldn't stay in bed probably, like he should. Would go on each and every mission while ill, like he shouldn't. Wouldn't be able to fight as effectively, and then he would...
Aya sighed quietly, once more very much cross with himself. Why the hell am I so morbid today...?
He hurriedly ran his fingers through his hair, immediately patting his thick, jagged bangs back into place as he followed the slithering trail of raindrops that Ken had left behind as a marker across the entryway to the coat racks -- where the other now stood, puddling up the glossy floor. He shook his grey coat off with a shiver, and hung it up alongside Ken's, then he turned around to survey their oh-so-familiar surroundings.
Every time Aya entered that particular building, he was always reminded of an old American TV show he'd once seen one sleepless night. Rather, the lingering image of the last scene of said episode: A middle aged man -- the last survivor of a nuclear attack -- was sitting on the steps of a library, a multitude of books tumbled about him on the crumbling, marble steps. He was delighting in the fact that he now could read as he wished, uninterrupted.
And then -- and Aya couldn't quite remember how -- his glasses wound up hopelessly broken upon the unforgiving, snow-colored stone.
As the swordsman ventured forth into the gleaming glass and metal castle of ideas and wishes, he was thinking of it yet again. Of the irony of it. The barest twitch of a smile flickered over his lips like the flame of a newly struck match, and then it wafted away.
Computers lined the walls on the ground floor; on the others too, as he recalled. Not that he was all that interested in them -- and he guessed that Ken felt pretty much the same way as he did. Such things were Omi's domain for a reason.
Besides, Aya already knew where he wanted to go: To the place where the poets had spun their dreams for the world to see. To where the vicious ghouls dwelt, lurking behind innocent looking covers to frighten anyone who might happen by. And to journey to those mysterious and exotic lands, he would have to go upstairs, to the second floor.
He started towards the stairs, anticipating, then stopped in mid step to peer over his shoulder at the brunet, voice very soft despite their utter aloneness. As if he were afraid he'd unwittingly awaken some vengeful specter by talking in his usual tone.
"Are you coming?"
Ken wiped his nose on the back of his hand before Aya turned around. He hated to think what a look he would have gotten if his companion had seen the little breech of etiquette.
"Are you coming?" It general, he would have expected this would sound more like "Are you planning to cross me and thereby end you own life?" but somehow the voice so usually shot with ice had lost the unique threatening quality. In the context of the leader of Weiss, this nearly struck Ken as kind. Sure, the words were faint, even in the fae stillness of the building, but still.
"Ah, in a bit!" He gave Aya a wink. "I was actually gonna go look something up quick."
No reply. At least, not a voiced one. But the air between them was rife with implications, nearly shimmering with them.
"Well, maybe not quick..." Ken corrected, taking a moment to rub his neck. "Something in the non-fiction section. That's where I'm gonna be for awhile, if you care to join me..."
I know you don't but that's not going to stop me from offering!
"But you know, if it's not your thing, feel that's fine. In fact, I bet motorcycle maintenance is boring to you."
Now wait just a second! He's gonna think there's something wrong with the bike! You'll never get him back on it now!
Think of something quick!
"Especially when it comes to trying to improve something that's already great and..."
Congratulations, you made things worse ^_^;;;
"And the fact I've never even tried that before! I won't know where to look at all!"
It was all he could do to smirk and try to look knowing, while sensing with ever fiber of his being he had crossed the line between carrying the persona of a loveable goof and carrying the persona of a foolish, vapid twit.
And yet, his smile surely came out pure somehow, for there was bitter irony to this sugar coated idiocy.
Aya probably thought he was a foolish, vapid twit regardless.
Which made the way he'd wrapped his arms around his waist all the more tantalizing.
Aya's expression had gone from a mere curious peek over one shoulder to a panicked quirk of eyebrows to a full-bodied, slightly bewildered stare.
He wants to improve the motorcycle, but it's already great, and he's going to search through the library's collection of manuals until he finds the one he needs...Yet, he doesn't really know where to look at all.
Uh-huh.
Aya slipped his hands into his back pockets, head tilted slightly to one side and eyes narrowed in thought. Again, he felt like Ken was up to something, but damned if he couldn't figure out what.
But he...has a smile like an angel...
Unconsciously, a tiny smile flickered over the redhead's lips in answer, warming his eyes just a fraction. Then he blinked and it was gone. He drew his hands out of his pockets and assumed his usual stiff-backed stance.
"Whatever," he murmured, hitching one shoulder in a small shrug. Miyamoto and Lao-Tsu and Rimbaud awaited his presence on the next floor, and he didn't want to keep them waiting any longer.
"Well, I know what I want."
He turned away and headed towards the stairs, quickly carried off by his long-legged stride, booted feet sinking into the cushy, dark blue carpet -- only recently laid down from the feel of it. Aya felt a little like he was walking on springs.
The conversation was clearly over...Or so anyone who'd been watching them would think. But then, just as said invisible onlooker might have turned away, bored, Aya twisted around to peek at Ken again. One hand on the rail. Voice as soft as before.
"But if you want, I'll come back and help you look."
It's almost like he doesn't know where he's going to look at all... Ah, you say that, Aya my boy, but I've got a little wisp somewhere in my mind that says you don't know what you want at all... and it makes me feel so sorry for you I...
"But if you want, I'll come back and help you look."
Ken gulped... and audibly too for the vast and comforting silence of the library. And then he did something that felt like cuddling a teddy bear and tearing off its head at the same time. "Nah, that's OK." And his companion faded away.
Ken was all alone. He couldn't help but think of some show and old friend had told him about. Something about a blind man in a library. It hadn't made much sense in bed, even if Ken could have heard himself reciting the telling to himself.
This seemed like he was only doing something to push Aya away for a million years, something not even the stars would take back. And Aya could not see, or didn't not care to reveal that he might. Like they were the last two humans left alive and split by a rift of space dust. Yes, the leader of Weiss had sort of a cosmic nuance to his nature. Pushing away, yet cradling interest, as if something in him treasured it. It made Ken question his faith in roses.
Had this happened... before?
He knew now. Roses. Books. Looking. He would be here awhile.
What would Aya read? What would he do and think and feel? What if he was only by himself and staring at the rain?
Ken shook his head and started towards the literary criticism reference, followed by his déjà vu and his many regrets in life.
But maybe he could go back...
In the sepulchral silence of the second floor, Aya wove through the stacks, sorting through the books he knew he wanted, and the previously unread ones that had caught his eye:
A doorstop sized Haiku anthology; the aforementioned Rimbaud -- in both French and Japanese; Shelley.
Miyamoto's treatises on the samurai code and way of the sword -- must reads for any practitioner of Kendo. Texts he'd read before, but always found himself turning to time and time again.
And...hidden away amongst those weighty, intellectual tomes, was a book about one Lestat.
The books hung in the hollow just above his hip, tucked in one arm. Comfortable, and real, and soothing. Books were his anchor.
The idle thought drifted into the forefront of his consciousness then -- Of his arms around Ken's waist. He would never have clung to Youji like that. Omi either. It would be ridiculous in both cases, him seeking solace from them.
Youji would have laughed. Would have teased him unmercifully.
Omi would have either gotten all worried. He was more to be protected than protector...Or so Aya always secretly felt.
But Ken? Aside from his initial balking of doing so, he had thought no more about being so positioned against Ken. It had seemed natural, somehow, that he had sought comfort from him. Just his presence was soothing at times.
When he wasn't trying to argue with or hit him.
An unseen quirk of a smile flitted over his face as he moved over one stack, to where the ideas of Chinese philosophers and poets dwelt. Not an unfamiliar place for him to be, really. He'd always gravitated to this section every time he came to visit.
Its cloth cover was torn along the back edge, and the kanji, painted down the front of it in fine, gold lettered brushstrokes, was half faded away from years of handling. But Aya knew what it was without looking any further than its red binding. The Tao. Lao-Tsu's philosophical masterpiece. He'd read that particular copy himself several times, and always, he found a great source of inspiration.
Centuries-old, life-altering wisdom bound up in a mere book. Advising non-action; acceptance. Freely bending to the will of Fate.
He'd learned when he was a boy, when he first took up Kendo, how closely philosophy and martial arts were intertwined. At his master's encouragement, he had delved not only in Zen texts, but in Lao-Tsu's work, among others. He had tried to practice those philosophies in his own life. Had honestly thought he could.
And had ultimately failed.
The whole of his life now revolved around one point. One crushing moment, in which the things and the people he held most dear were cruelly snatched away. And he could accept none of it.
Aya reverently fingered the book, running his fingertips lightly across the time-dulled, gold-leafed pages, and then he opened it. The sheets flipped lazily from cover to cover, kanji flowing in a blur of black print before his eyes.
And then, the book softly fell closed between Aya's palms.
Its message no longer held any meaning for him -- except that it was an unattainable ideal.
He gathered up his precious burden, then put the tome back in the gaping hole where it had resided.
Then Aya walked away.
Ken, frankly, could not find anything. Or was it that he had uncovered too much? The aura of still and voiceless raindrops was all that clung to his mind besides his task, and it had nothing to say to him.
Searching the catalogue for "rose" had turned up a morass of romance novels, and although thoroughly embarrassed to have wandered into such a disreputable section of literature, even with no one around to have pointed out his odd presence there, he was still quite flustered by the racks and racks of women in the arms of liberally greased men in all manner of absurd costumes.
This brief foray had found him for a few moments in the fiction section, which was somewhat near literature itself, as opposed to the references downstairs. He thought he had glimpses Aya, a crimson and black shadow drifting like brilliant seafoam somewhere in front of the far window, but he had slipped away himself, praying he'd not been seen.
The mishap only affirmed one thing he had off and on been considering all day.
This is going to be harder than I thought...
Besides, everyone already knew that roses were a symbol of love! This unfortunate spell of being lost had taught him NOTHING! NOTHING!
He skulked back to the computers and tried to think of how Omi would have set up the search. Computers were not his forte. Not at all.
And has he input search after convoluted search, he could not stop thinking about the mishap, no matter what he did.
I'm stuck on this now, greaaaaaaat.
Well, there's always the question of why...
But I don't have time for that.
You had time to leave work and sneak out to the library to think about roses.
Yeah! So goddamnit! I'm gonna think about roses!
OK, well what kind of love to roses represent?
Well... romantic of course. I think. I mean, They show up in all kinds of situations.
Maybe this means Aya's got a sweetie?
Yeah, and you know what else? Youji's gonna pick up the prime minister for hot, body thumping sex, Omi's going to swear the varnish off the table and Persia will decide to have a picnic with Takatori somewhere in hell where they both are.
But Ken paused in the middle of a particularly complex line of anding. His hands felt very cold all of a sudden, yet they seemed damp. His eyes hurt. He wiped his fingers on his jeans and continued. One such little thing was no matter for a member of Weiss.
Again... Why?
Why are you even here?
How come romance novels are always about a guy and a girl, why not two girls, or two guys. I'm sure someone, somewhere would read that kind of thing.
He had to smother a chuckle with his fist. Laughing out loud here just seemed like laughing at a funeral, or a very serious tactics session.
Ok! So, why are any of us here?
And why don't you go thumb through these books instead of fighting this thing. I don't think you're problems are current enough for a computer.
Next moment, he chair was empty and crooked and a soft shuffling could be heard in the literature reference section. Anyone passing the alcove would have found a dozen volumes, all with indexes spread.
Whipcord-thin and as pale of face as a specter, Aya glided slowly around the remaining stacks. Browsing as opposed to intently searching, pausing from time to time to lay his burden down on the odd empty shelf and pull yet another likely-looking book out for casual perusal.
But then, he tired of that activity. He'd found what he'd wanted, after all, and he didn't have a reason to stay any longer.
No personal reason that was...Except...
He didn't want to disappoint Ken.
He'd been so eager to come here. Very eager. Thinking back on it now, Aya'd realized he'd never seen him so wanting to come to the library. Not that he wasn't one for reading -- Aya'd seen him with some book in hand before. But...It was all so strange. As if he had a real purpose in visiting, and not merely to spend a few rainy day hours amidst the dusty stacks.
No, it seemed he had a mystery on his hands. A minor one, true, but an interesting one.
And it was made even more so to the redhead when he ducked out of the endless row of the American literature section to go to his usual corner of the second floor. One little used by patrons, he'd found.
Until today. Someone had had the same idea he'd had.
And Aya had a good idea who that someone was.
Stealthily he moved closer to the book-strewn alcove, glancing cautiously around for signs of Ken, even up to the time he quietly set his own selections down to thumb through the open volumes. At once he recognized them for what they were; no surprise there, really, for Aya'd had used such things before. But that Ken was using them...?
He bent down to study the page of the volume before him, finding it in 'R'.
'R'? 'R' for what? Aya's finger slowly drifted down the columns.
'R' is for rainbows, and rice, and...
...Roses.
Aya shifted his foggy attention to the stack of yawning books above the one in front of him. Roses. Had Ken wanted to know about roses?
If so, why?
He drew himself up, and drew his hand away, and then, he heard the soft, yet unmistakable sounds of someone moving about in one of the nearby stacks. The rasp of cloth against cloth as books were removed and put back.
It was as drowsily rhythmic as a lullaby.
Aya leaned up against the wall next to the cluttered table and waited, listening with eyes closed.
Ken had become most wise in his quest for an answer to his nagging question. He had become the living avatar of a very, very old maxim.
Sadly it was this -- it is a wise man who knows he knows nothing.
And Ken was by this point convinced he knew nothing. He could not find a page that agreed with another page. If all these writers were to be gathered in the library now, he supposed they should have fought among themselves until there was nothing left of them save scraps of their clothing that had been torn off in the fray.
A rose was indicative of the female genitals and nothing else, a rose was a symbol of purity, whoever had related it to unmentionable parts was a fool. A rose was a left over Victorian ideal, a rose was a just a flower and everyone else had better shut up.
He was thrilled to merely come upon someone who also found the myriad of meanings and dared not make sense of them.
"The idea of calling my book The Name of the Rose came to me virtually by chance, and I liked it because the rose is a symbolic figure so reach in meaning that it hardly has any meaning left: Dante's mystic rose, and go lovely rose, the War of the Roses, rose thou art sick, too many rings around Rosie, a rose by any other name, a rose is a rose is a rose is a rose, the Rosicrucians. The title rightly disoriented the reader who was unable to choose just one interpretation..."
Ken bit his lip and fumed silently. So I haul my butt out here in the rain and someone makes FUN of my problem? Someone... PLAYS with roses? Who is this sicko...
He flipped to the spine for a moment and read, Umberto Eco.
Why if I ever get my hands on him! Why I'll...
Now, now... and inner voice shushed him. Look at yourself, Ken my boy. You think he's a sicko because he has a good time manipulating something you admittedly don't understand. Obviously, you're thereby adhering to the interpretation of Miss Paglia over there.
Yeah, really, I'll NEVER be able to look at a rose without laughing now.
But is that how Aya feels? You're not Aya, you can not feel just the same as Aya...
Ken lifted his eyes from the page and stared at the ceiling for a moment. He must have looked as if he was praying, there splayed out among a host of literary reference books, half caught by the lights and half by the slight illumination of the rain.
Well, Mr. Eco. Maybe you know what to do.
And then he saw it. "I remember that Abelard used the example of a sentence Nulla rosa est to demonstrate how language can speak both of the nonexistent and the destroyed."
He took a moment to rest the side of his face on his hand... he was just about to speak his conclusion to himself when he thought he caught the sound of someone moving nearby...
Some time went by before Aya realized the shuffling had ceased. He opened his eyes, half-expecting to see Ken, but, of course, found himself alone.
But then, he usually was.
He leaned back against the wall, and gazed at the slate grey sky through the windows. Rain swished against the rectangular panes. The wind wailed around the side of the building, and Aya shivered in sympathy.
He turned away from the window to look at his surroundings. Really look. And it only made him feel even more isolated than before. No humans. Only books.
Ideas and logic and facts.
Suddenly he felt so melancholy.
He shoved his hands in his pockets and pushed away from the wall with one booted foot, leaving only a narrow black streak on the pastel papered wall as a clue.
Fuck. Where is Ken?
He briskly set off down another aisle of books, feeling as if at any moment the shelves would tip, spilling their contents down on top of him. Crushing him.
By the time he'd cleared it, his heart was beating in fright. He could feel it beating in his throat, as if it had leapt from its hollow in his chest.
I'm being unreasonable.
I'm being utterly foolish.
He now stood in the center of another little walkway, stacks on all sides of him. Surrounded, as it were. And still, all he could hear was the distant gush of the rain and wind.
No bad singing; no steady beat of a heart along with his own.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
He took a few deep breaths to center himself, to force himself to relax, and then, after a time, he heard it: The faint flip of pages. Of books being pushed aside. He set off in the direction of the sound.
There were desks there, he knew, and as he got closer the sounds of life grew louder. The rustle of clothing as its wearer moved. Low, exasperated muttering. One corner twitched upward. Yeah, it was Ken all right.
Aya took his hands out of his pockets as he rounded the corner, but no sooner did he see Ken than he stopped in his tracks.
He was that transfixed by what he saw.
From the way he was sitting, Ken looked like a saint in a Renaissance painting, his face softly aglow with Heaven's radiance. Even though the light was actually more man-made than not.
Then he moved, and he was simply Ken again. But that wasn't right either. There was nothing simple about him. Nothing commonplace.
Aya watched him for a moment, then silently crossed the short space that separated them and came up behind his chair, a little off to the side. Peered over his shoulder at the texts on the desk, then back at him. Studied the strong curve of his jaw.
"Why are you suddenly so interested in roses?"
The voice came up so suddenly in the otherwise quietude of the library, Ken rather jumped and nearly dropped the book he was holding. He managed to escape having only rather bent a page, but it was still embarrassing.
Grinning dumbly, he turned to Aya and spoke gaily, "There you are!" And then he also lowered his voice because it had become rather loud... or maybe that was but the reaction he would have had to any noise that was not raindrop related, after having gone without them for so long. "I was wondering where you'd popped off to all this time. We can stay longer if you want I mean..."
But the he paused and took a moment to really look at his companion, who wore presently the most peculiar guise... though he had been shifting through quite a few of them in the past hours. He looked as one who has been awakened from a dream only to find some image from it wrought against reality. Longing, reverence, all with a touch of fear and wonder. This on Aya who seldom showed more than a glimpse of some shady chill.
And scowled presently.
"Oh, right... about the roses, err... well, you know we do work in a flower shop and all and I was gettin' kinda bored just you know, looking at them, so I decided maybe I should think about them for awhile." he ended his sentence with a shrug, not to emotion the wondering of where his reply had come from. He hadn't exactly prepared for the question, and he hadn't expected he'd ever be able to fib so damn well without precognition. "Not that you or the other make me bored of course." He chuckled, more for his own slyness. "Hey, are you ready to go maybe? Or are you just checkin' up on me?"
The longer Ken talked, the more nonsense that spilled from his mouth, the softer Aya's expression grew, until the scowl had completely melted away. His face now donning a thoughtful mask, the swordsman merely looked at him. Studied him.
So earnest was Ken in stating his reasons, that it struck the redhead as comical...So much so that he would have laughed outright -- if he were Ran, and not Aya.
But Aya he was, and so only one corner twitched in helpless amusement. He was just so...
So...
Aya pushed aside a few straying books, and set his own selections down in the lopsided patch of cleared table. "We can stay here for awhile longer," he said as he folded himself up in the chair next to Ken's. "I don't care. I mean, since you're so eager to learn about roses..."
Another twitch of his mouth as he flipped open one of his books and fingered down the table of contents, looking for a particular poem. A favorite one.
"Of course, I don't know why you didn't just ask me."
Ken indulged himself. He had no reason not to. After all, Aya certainly indulging in his own present absurdities. Why, for the first he could recall with any certainty, Aya appeared to be, well, not especially enraged. Oh, how Ken smirked.
"I have no idea, Aya old pal. Guess I was just too absorbed in my research. Obsession is am amaaaaaaaazing thing."
Saying this, he picked himself up. At least, himself and an armload of books, several of which tumbled to the floor created some seriously nerve wracking crashes. "But I'd say I've been obsessed enough for one day, not that I've got quotas or anything, but I'm about read to go." This said, he began ladling the books back onto their shelves... or at least reasonable approximations of their shelves, with barely the tips if his fingers for the rest of him was quite concerned with keeping their brothers and sisters from falling to their metaphorical deaths. Why hadn't he just left them on the floor and put them away one by one?
Stupid Ken~!
Either way, it was going to take a moment or two... or three... he just grinned, but when he came to the copy of The Name of the Rose, he took a serious moment to consider it.
"Ne, Aya? Can you do me a favor? I just remembered that I don't exactly have my library card..." Because I'm a big, stupid baka and I left with out it of course! "... could you check that out for me? I swear I'll remember to return it on time."
Obsessions. Aya knew about that subject all too well. After all, he lived with one every single day of his life, and would continue to hold that one close until he could permanently put an end to the root of it.
Whenever he picked up his katana and swung it at an opponent, be it real or imaginary, he always saw his face. Saw his blood flow...
The pages he held ran like melted butter from the crook of his hand, falling freely onto the pile with the rest. Aya closed the book, let his fingers drift over it. The cloth cover felt smooth beneath his light caress, its texture having been worn down by the touch of countless hands.
Time could change things, change people for good or ill -- he was no exception.
The only thing was, he didn't know under which category he fell.
Aya heard Ken's summons, and mentally shook off his grim musings as he half-turned to find him in the midst of a life-or-death struggle with an overwhelming stack of books. He scooped up his books, quirking a brow at him as he got to his feet.
But he knew under which category Ken fell.
"Aa, I'll check it out for you," he replied, making a beeline for him, his eyes trained on the book in question. He'd read it long ago, and was surprised to find it as Ken's sole choice. Never knew he would ever be so interested in such a work as that. Silently, he took the book and laid it along with his selections on an empty corner of a shelf. Then he reached for the burdensome bundle in Ken's arms, wriggling a healthy handful of the unhandy tomes free.
"And I'll put these up, too" he added, and then turned away to do precisely that.
Ken's heart fluttered so, and at a mere glance of Aya's. Not even one meant for him, but one that fell upon the novel he had handed his companion. A slight look of recognition. Aya knew this book! Or knew of it.
Ken was Weiss, he would take what he could get.
At least, he was now Weiss. Was. WAS. Now. A delirious lightness came upon him.
"You've read that?"
Aya nodded. Ken smirked.
"Aa, well, thanks for all this, I mean, giving me a hand, using your card... comin' with me and all."
Aya only spared him a glance indicating he had heard his words. And so the clawed boy among the white hunters fell back to earth and heard words from long ago, ringing in his head, fading away like footsteps as he was left... left somewhere.
"But I don't get it!"
"I'm not gonna read it again just for you..."
"Then tell me where we're supposed to be in this."
"We're not IN the book. The book is about another world. Two worlds where time and space are divorced. One is called..."
But they both dissolved around him and he found himself in the library, behind his leader, instead of the other way around as they had been on the way there. Aya had... Aya had the most exquisite ivory neck, just barely exposed between his sweater and his crimson floss. It was all of him anyone could ever bare to see, be graced to see, Ken supposed, for his face bore only the beauty of desolation, and the rest of his form remained concealed.
The clerk's computer was beeping gaily as it removed their trove of pages from the "IN" complement of books. She yawned loudly.
You're thinking this... about HIM? What's wrong with you? Get ahold of yourself!
But you know more about him than he knows about himself maybe, I think that's earned me at least the honor of pitying him.
But I can't do that.
He did, however, thank his companion for a second time as they dashed out to the parking lot after the motorbike. And even more wretched cold have descended with the afternoon, and the rain itself had refracted into a think, damp haze, which only became obvious when seem creeping in the distance, like packs of ghostly cats descended upon Tokyo. He barely saw them as he stashed their hoard away and took a moment to mop the water from the seat, which still proved cold once he had taken it himself.
Aya required a moment more to follow.
"It's a good day for beef sukiyaki, whaddya say? Something nice and hot when we get back [1]? To think this is summer! I tell ya."
And there were the other man's hands, looped so meticulously about his waist, the tenderness of fear softening the muscles. A smile came to his lips and he knew no one of consequence would ever see it. As if the motorists whizzing past cared anything for a pair of guys on a bike, waiting to pull out of the library parking lot.
But Whooosh! There he and Aya went, down the road in a cocoon of spay, hidden among thousands upon thousands of salary men and housewives on their way home for dinner and any semblance of a family they possessed. This was Japan after all.
So then again, most of 'em are probably after some warm sake.
Ken passed a small Toyota whose owner was preoccupied with a cell phone, and as he did so, felt the fingers on his shirt grow tense.
So he petted them, almost absently. And at once regretted his over kindness.
The light before them abruptly lost its golden hue and he skidded somewhat as he stopped. A word or two of apology flickered on his tongue. But never came.
Someone tapped him on the shoulder. Someone with nails.
"Hidaka Ken?" A small voice, feminine and perfumed with a European accent so strongly, he thought at first it had given an obscure Welsh greeting.
He said nothing, but turned and beheld a small girl, fair and light but lost in the folds of an enormous, extravagant olive suitjacket -- not to mention a man's, which was not buttoned, and so between its buttons he could see she was otherwise clad in a sailor suit, such as any middle school would have required.
Had it not been made of saffron and cobalt silk.
The little girl chuckled. Did she think he was checking her out as he observed that erroneous little bit of fabric covering her? "Fancy meeting you here! Now I don't have to walk all the way to the Koneko!"
Before he could have said or done anything besides allow his hear to beat, he found himself holding a little parchment envelope and just catching the sight of the ribbons in her hair fluttering away.
One is called..."
Ken felt naught, saw not, breathes not. His thoughts still disintegrated, the memories... reforming into this. Had the light changed? He didn't know. All he knew was had been writ on the burgundy parchment he'd found within the envelop.
[Owing to the revelations of recent events, we on Terra invite you to join us once more. In penance for our previous ignorance, tithes have been waved for you and any companions for five years time. Please come visit us at the Hyacinth Villa if the roots shake. Do not come if the leaves shake. Savil knows the way.]
Ken cared not if the leaves shook or not. He ripped up the note and threw it into the street, where, as he drove away to a caconophy of car horns, it pirouetted in the torrents or rainwater, and fell into the sewer never to be reclaimed.
Note [1]: I was served this on cold days while I was in Japan, so it can't be that odd... I think.
To see a child approach Ken wasn't unusual. To see a child approach Ken whilst he was on his motorcycle in the middle of a busy street, though -- that WAS unusual. Aya'd had expressed his curiosity in his typically subtle way -- a quirk of one finely arched dark brow and no words to accompany it.
But what was in the envelope? Why did Ken look so odd when he'd read it? And why did he shred it and toss it away so carelessly, to make it just more garbage to clog the sewer, to be washed up elsewhere.
Aya flicked his starry gaze to the man in front of him. Each one had a separate life, free from Weiss, from each other. One where they could show those hidden corners of their hearts and souls.
What was Ken's like?
Aya realized that he longed to know.
The cycle sped through the streets, fearlessly zigzagging here and there between the cars. Aya reckoned that that was how Ken usually drove it: Flying through the Tokyo traffic without a thought to the danger. Maybe, given their night jobs, being so reckless on a shining motorcycle, with the wind in one's hair and someone's arms wrapped around you, didn't seem quite so dangerous.
So, silent Aya stayed. Merely slid his arms more tightly around Ken, chest to back, cradling him between his thighs. Eyes closed, and the feather-light tickle of brown strands against his pale cheeks.
A bowl of sukiyaki would never make him any warmer than he was at that moment.
Ken dove. Mindlessly. Thoughtlessly.
Aya said nothing.
He in other circumstances should have sworn his heart had reached fingers into his ears and was squeezing them. He breathed so hard his chest ached, gripped the handle bars so hard his fingers turned white as snow.
Aya said nothing.
And if that wasn't maddening enough, his companion was leaning so close to him, he started to feel like the velveteen rabbit... the initial shock began to ease, somewhat, trickling, blooming into a stupefying calm.
"...One is called Antiterra;..."
His own fingers patted Aya's again, and he dropped to a somewhat more reasonable speed. He'd frightened him again... how thoughtless. The girl had been thoughtless, but that was her place in the world. They were all like that... he was like that. Aya. Poor Aya.
"...that's hell."
What the hell had Aya thought of all this!?
Nothing or he would have done somthing. No, if anything possessed Aya, it was that nagging unhappiness of being on the bike in the first place.
"Then there's Terra;..."
As he ground to a halt before the Koneko no Musume, his senses began to return, wandering back into him and the spaces once possessed only by dread.
Dread of what? Get a hold of yourself Ken! After all...
"...Terra is kinda like heaven."
But that still doesn't mean I have to go back. No, I'm Weiss now... I'm Weiss... I'm...
Just another chap getting off his bike that afternoon. One more man returning home among the flood of car and sopping people. One more person, getting ready to make dinner.
He gave Aya's hands a barely tangible squeeze as they dismounted.
"Hey, I'll cook everything tonight! Don't you worry about a thing... OK, I promise not to burn it. I guess you can warm up the heater awhile. God it's cold... I'll be ready about..."
His watch read 5:02. So dinner would be at six.
Two hours too early on Terra.
Omi did so hate to admit it, but this drive had become monotonous some time ago.
Not unpleasant, but somewhere beyond the bizarre Tokyoites neologisms of Stumbling Dogs. The rain had begun to lull him to sleep, yet the incorrigible aroma of cigarette smoke tickled his throat, insisting he at least remain awake enough to stifle the occasional cough. Coughing would be awfully rude. Youji obviously took great pride in his little black car...
But there was one saving grace that had kept him more than occupied these hours.
The car was filled with secret cubbies of candy.
Probably candy intended to serve Youji's many dates in the absence of liquor, but candy none the less, and candy the driver was always in a mood to share it seemed.
Yogurt wafers, sesame hard candies, blueberry jellies... actually, more jellies than the average schoolgirl ate in a year in a myriad of flavors, barley sugar lollipops form the US, packets of almond crunch pokey, Glico cherry twigs, morrinaga's mysterious cool summer drops, buttercream caramels, and, his personal favorite the infatescimal sugar drops they sold in bottles at the sanrio stores.
He had just finished a tube actually.
"Ne, Youji-kun? I hate to be rude, but are we there YET?"
The seventh cigarette of the return trip hung in the curve between his index and middle finger, trickling a pale blue fog into the artificially heated air. He'd barely taken a hit from it since lighting it, but no matter -- for Youji, sometimes simply holding one was enough of a comfort. The smoke curling around his oft thorn-pricked fingers, warming them negligibly.
Wished it could warm him all over, but nothing and no one had ever been able to do that, not since...
He forced her face out of his mind, and lifted the cigarette for a drawn out puff. Eyes as pure green as a newly furled fern frond peered at the blond boy who lay curled up on the seat next to him.
A simple question, and he suddenly felt so old. And he had no idea why.
"Are we at the flower shop? Well, no, Omi, we aren't -- as you can plainly see. Are we in Tokyo? Yes." He smirked. "And what are you complaining about anyway? We learned the wheres and whys about Takatori's latest smuggling scheme, just like Persia wanted us to do. And now, you're getting to ride about in a gorgeous, head-turning British sportscar with a sexy, head-turning Japanese guy -- all with all the candy you can eat. So what do you have to complain about, kid?"
He grinned, surreptitiously letting his gaze roam over the youth's slender build...And then he quickly looked back to the road before his thoughts could take a lascivious turn. The cigarette once more slithered between his lips.
In his head, he could hear her laugh.
"When will you ever learn?"
Damned if I know, baby.
The keys went back into his pocket with a cheery tinkle, and Aya padded into the shop. It was just as cold inside as it was outside. Maybe more so.
Of course, out there, he had Ken to curl up next to. He could still feel the hard, smooth lines of him; the tenderness of his palm on his terror-stricken hands.
No emotions: His mentor, Shion, had taught him that, and Aya had taken those lessons to heart, so strong was his desire to kill his greatest foe, and avenge his ruined family. Only to Aya-chan did he show the truth.
The longer he'd gotten to know them though, the harder it became to keep himself apart, to stay unemotional always. Especially around Ken.
He rolled that notion around his head as he wiped down his work table, the heater all hot and orange before his stockinged feet. He could hear the brunet moving around as he got down to work.
Aya headed towards the kitchen, tossing the dust cloth into the laundry room as he passed. He could hear the plop and sizzle of steak as Ken threw it into the skillet. The brunet himself loomed up before Aya's eyes as he drew up to the threshold, and he admired him to his heart's content, leaning his lanky frame against the scuffed jamb.
"Don't you think it was rude of you tear up that child's invitation?"
Ken had just lost himself in his cooking when he remembered he should probably put on an apron, and Ken had just gotten over his profound embarrassment regarding wearing said apron, when he heard Aya, speaking to him.
If that wasn't bad enough, he was using that lilt. The little boy I-saw-what-you-did-with-mommy-last-night, -- daddy nuance, barely discernable, but omnipresent in the perpetual critiques of decorum he made. The worst of it was, Ken found it endearing in an utterly pathetic sort of way. Then again, he found Aya sort of pathetic and had admitted that to himself during the course of this very, very, long day.
He turned, and, not only that, but there was Aya. Aya not observing the preparation of the steak, but rather... him.
How many times have I lied today? God...
So he told at least part of the truth that was in his heart.
"Some things its better not to keep, old buddy. Kids never learn that, but I got it from them. Now that note was between her, myself, and her somewhat older sister, who's one of the girls who comes by the shop. Enough said, isn't it?" He sighed and fished his companion's chopsticks out of the drawer. "Last thing I need in my life is charges of handling the kids, or our patrons 'inappropriately'. Whatever that's supposed to mean. "
Before Aya had a chance to respond, one quiet sort of fear in the deep corridors of his heart tugged at him inside. One of the girls that comes here...
She sounded like she hadn't...
Better look, just the same...
He motioned he would return at once, and jogged into his room for a moment. The bed was still only semi-made, the window locked, his trophies and schedules undisturbed. FYOU.
So he headed back into the kitchen and shrugged.
Omi blushed furiously, burying both his hands and the empty bottle of sweets in his yellow windbreaker. "I'm sorry, Youji-kun!" He burst out, stopping then at the sound of his own voice... he sounded like he was glad to be sorry.
No, no! I'm glad I got to spend the day with Youji! On a nice, little, relaxing mission.
Well, maybe not relaxing. At least not super stressful.
And he's right! This is a very, very, very neat car! Thinking that, he wriggled his feet from his sneakers and let his warm socks be warmed uninhibitedly by the lower heaters. The neatest car I've ever been in. Ahh.
But the warmth trickling up his jeans did more than allay his case of goosebumps. It made him realize once again how very, very sleepy he was. The clock on the dash read 6:33. An utterly unholy hour for someone who had been up since 3:15. He swallowed another yawn, followed directly by another sesame candy. At least it turned out to be sesame. They had just crossed the gulf between two streetlights. The clouds must have been miles thick for it to be this dark already, for the streetlights to show up like hallucinatory foxfire as their gleams bounced past his lashed.
"Saa, thank you for taking me out with you today. I know you were planning to go alone and all."
He glanced over at the driver once more as he spoke, and the first think he saw of him was the finger twined so reverently around the cigarette, followed by the sleeve of his silk shirt, taught against the muscles of his forearm. The wavy yellow hair just touching his shoulders, the two eyes above the drooping glasses that just barely hung on his nose. Omi started to smile, and then he remembered two things.
The next light they stopped at, he reached over and gently plucked those glasses away, his fingers ever so slightly brushing Youji's nose. "Gomen-ne. but you really shouldn't wear these to drive at night... and didn't you tell me we weren't going back to koneko?"
"Oi! Who's the adult and who's the kid here? I can see just fine with my shades on, Omi," Youji protested, trying very much to be stern in both tone and expression, but the slight twitch of his mouth as he struggled to keep from smiling ruined the effect.
The car drifted up to another light, practically purring. Youji drew out another cigarette and lit it, then turned to Omi, his lips automatically sliding into a grin. "And no, I wasn't planning on going back to Koneko just now. I mean, why should I? It's Saturday night! Time to relax and enjoy one's self." He prodded the boy on the shoulder with one ringed finger. "And that means assassins too."
His expression softened then, ensnared as he was Omi's beauty. Such moments happened on occasion, and at the oddest times. He'd look over at him, ready to scold or tease, and then it would hit him.
The streetlight on the corner slanted cream yellow across him, sparkling through his dark blond hair, falling across the side of his face and over his shoulder. He looked like a fragile, lost waif, the faint smudges under his eyes only adding to the effect.
Youji had the strangest urge to scoop him up in his arms, and hold him close.
Behind him then, a cacophony of car horns burst forth, tearing his impulsive longings asunder. The cigarette was back in his mouth, and they were off again.
Get ahold of yourself, man!
He took a deep drag of his cig, then ground the rest of it out in the ash-encrusted tray. Laughed a little, somewhat self-consciously.
"Of course, you're tired, I can see it. So if you want to go back to the shop, I'll drop you off there. But," he added, slipping him a quick glance as he made a left turn. "You're welcome to come with me."
"Well..." Omi began with a shy little smirk playing on his face. It was hard not to show emotion in that situation. Why, Aya himself probably would have grimaced gaily at the face Youji made when those cars started honking at him. "Kids are people too!" Was it Youji's grin or his own
Now don't look to eager.
"Sure, I'll go with you." Said with a bright sort of disinterest, somewhat obviously false. "I promise not to be a bother." To this, he added a bow, hands humbly pressed together before him. Thanks to the graces of luck, he also managed to be tilted downwards when the latest of his choked yawns took him.
You've gone without sleep for days on end. You know it. I know it. Youji knows it. You stop yawning.
I doubt I could sleep when I got home anyway... too many things to worry about...
He smiled again. Some things were worth harping on. At least in dreams.
Now that was what Youji wanted to hear. He clapped his delight on the black leather wrapped steeringwheel.
"All right! Glad to hear it, Omi-kun."
'Cause all you ever do after school and homework is hang around the den, on the computer -- and even then, it's mostly for work. Weekends you spend in the shop. When do you play, Omi?
"And you aren't a bother to me! Not one bit, not one bit!"
When do you sleep, for that matter? You're worried about something, aren't you kid?
He reached for the pack of Marlboros once more, only to find it empty. He crumpled it in one hand and tossed it over his shoulder, mouthing a curse. Of all the times to run out.
I'm worried too -- about you.
"And is that a blush I see?" He leered at him then, teasing, and promptly burst out laughing.
They were now in the city's center, the Times Square of the Far East. A sea of neon to swim through, and he was a shark in the midst of a school of tuna. A smile lit up his face far brighter than the tiny flame from his lighter ever could.
"So...What do you want, Omi? Do you want bright lights and loud music -- or are you seeking a little peace and quiet this evening? Your choice, and it's all on me tonight."
If there was anything that made Omi blush, it was having someone else point out the fact he was, in fact, already blushing. His face promptly felt like it had been smashed into a hot frying pan... and it was all he could do to hope Schuldich never get ahold of this peculiar inner analogy, since if performed literally...
What is wrong with me? Between the sugar and the lack of sleep... I'll wake up in a little bit. I only wish I knew how sane I'd be at the time.
Hopefully not too much! This is sure to make me look like a basket case but...
So here, in the city where clubbers leaned from cars, yelping like excited dogs covered with baubles, here surrounded by soapland, technoland and, let it be faced, hello kitty land; drowning in the cascades of light from a thousand whimsical facades; not to mention being in a car with probably one of the greatest unacknowledged party boys that ever lived, Omi asked, "Could we go to one of those themed teahouses? With the staff in costume? And the..." Endless servings of chocolate strawberry cake with itty-bitty icing animals on top? "...cake?" He paused then, one more burying his hands in his coat. They had gone cold again. "I can't seem to think of one in particular."
He braced himself for another playful leer... and surely enough, his fading
blush redoubled. Bother...
What are you trying to hide from me, Ken?
Don't you realize how foolish it is to even attempt to keep something from me?
I'm Weiss, same as you. I'll find out what it is.
Water hissed from the rim of the cast iron kettle, burbling over to spin down the sink drain, and Aya's attention immediately jerked back to the task at hand. His hands were damp and thoroughly chilled by the time he'd set it on top of the farthest eye. He wanted to curl them around Ken's waist again, bury them in the folds of his skin- warmed shirt.
He unrolled the sodden sleeve cuffs of his oversized black sweater down over them instead.
The cabinet beside the stove opened with a mousy squeak, and one by one, canisters and boxes landed on the counter.
"Bancha? Earl Grey? Formosa Oolong?"
Aya paused, lip curled in a sneer at the red-and-white gingham printed paper box in his hand. But it too, fell with a smack on the white formica counter. More dropped there than actually placed.
"Strawberry?"
Omi and his demanding sweet tooth.
Ken looked up from worrying their dinner with the longest pair of cooking chopsticks he had been able to scare up. Aya rooting through the tea, reading off the titles of the boxes. The sukiyaki presently more or less contained, he took a moment to watch him, hoping his expression would not be betrayed by the shine of the tea kettle.
Bancha: touched it lightly, let go before it hit the counter.
Earl Grey: held it for a half a second longer than the others, set it far away from the edge of the counter so it wouldn't fall.
Formosa Oolong: pure holy reverence even in the way he said the name.
Strawberry: (Ken giggled) thrown down as if the package exuded ignominy.
Aya's bum: A perfectly curved place of...
He gulped silently but heavily. More names floated in the air. He shook himself.
So, I wonder, would it be a gesture of some sort to you, what kind of tea I choose? Will you like me if I want Oolong? Find me brazen if I ask if we're out of jasmine? File me as a child in your brain if I decide I like what Omi likes?
"Formosa Oolong sounds good." He finally decided, trying not to sound too enthusiastic. "Thanks for getting' the tea ready. Hey, I do believe this is done at last! God bless hotplates on cold evenings."
But what about little girls in sailor fukus who doubtless had gotten cold legs on his account? No matter. Back to watching Aya!
"Oolong it is."
He popped the tightly jammed-on lid off the steel canister with the end of a teaspoon, sending a few dried leafy crumbles onto the counter top. Always happened, every single time he opened that particular tin.
Cups next. Aya opened the dish cabinet and found only two clean cups in residence. One made to look like dark purple marble, square in shape with a tiny chip on the rim. The other, and Aya had to smile at the sight of it, was a Pochacco cup, one Omi had bought at Sanrio once as a sort of joke for Ken.
So fitting, both of them.
He fished two strainers out of the drawer and dropped one each into the cups, then turned around...
...And found Ken was watching him.
Aya set everything down on the table, trying his damnedest to calm the sudden raging of his heart.
"Smells good, Ken."
"A teahouse? Hmmm..." Youji executed a neat, albeit sudden left turn down a side street. "I know just the place. Traditional to a 'T', right down their resident shamisen player. Lovely ladies in kimono with voices as soft as clouds, Omi." He sighed heavily, and reached up to push at his glasses -- which of course, weren't there. He'd almost forgot, so used to wearing him was he. Youji rubbed the bridge of his nose to cover his slip.
"Smiles as sweet as...Milk Chocolate Pocky." He chuckled.
But not as sweet as yours...
"Speaking of which, look in the dash and see if there's some...Oh! Wait! That's okay!" He grinned. "Because we. Are. Here."
The car glided through yet another light, and coasted sharply to the right. Up to the opening in a low, brown brick wall and through it. A squat building on the apex of a curved drive, separated from it by a bridge over a wide, manmade river. Youji supposed the owner wanted to give patrons the sense of crossing from one world into another.
Youji threw open his door and tossed the keys to the waiting valet, warning him to take it easy. Then he walked around to the other side and opened Omi's door, one hand extended towards him. One might think he'd simply forgotten he was in the company of a male instead of a female. One might also expect him to withdraw it with an embarrassed chuckle, and instead leave his companion to his own defenses.
But still it stayed, waiting for the sure weight of the boy's smooth palm to grace it.
"Shall we, Omi?"
"Ah, thanks Aya! But you
And magic is, almost by definition, unexpected... so...
But of course! Faced with the prospect of a meal that their leader might actually choose to communicate during, he had, himself, become downright trilled. Visitations from the past or not! This was too good to pass up.
That damnable pochocco cup was seeming more and more appropriate.
As Aya sat and faced him with those hazy silver-purple eyes, he assumed a decadently nonchalant air, leaning against the back of his chair for a bit too long before starting to serve sukiyaki as any good little housewife would have done, presenting the best area's of the pan to Aya. A moment of telling silence as they both had their tastes.
Hmm... not bad... maybe overdid the soy sauce but not too much. We'll see what he thinks...
Now, as for conversation... work is bad, real work is worse, his popping out on Thursdays to god knows where will get my head cut off... probably still kinda peeved about the ma with his rose incident... not a motorcycle person... yeah, really... let me see...
"Aya, there's somethin' I've been meaning to ask you." Many something, but this'll do... for now. "Saa, what do you think of kids? You know, just kids you see running around while we're out?"
Omi was flattered. No blush took him this time, he had not time to blush, nor will nor fear. But what do to? Surely this all was but one brazen echo of Youji's will. Sweet, yet nearly mocking. Cute, yet suave and domineering.
Odd but not worth over analyzing.
He reached up and took his companion's hand with his own. Their fingers met but he waited on weaving them together, did not take too much advantage of the waiting arm as he swung himself out of the car. Standing, he found that their linked palms had caused them to end up standing unusually close together. Should he let go?
He didn't, but he kept thinking he should. In the end, it was all they could do to cross the bridge, hand in hand. A passing matron of middle age allowed her eyes to linger inconspicuously upon them, and then hid a little grin behind her fan, before whispering something to her companion.
But that's... another girl o.o!!!
Omi blinked and allowed his own gaze to fall to the rippling koi below his feet.
Youji... his inner voice offered the plaint, but not his lips or his body.
And there passed then a man and a much younger woman, leaving the same teahouse. She all pearls and satin, he seeming to wish she would be transformed into some statue of his wishes.
Ah well...
They had left the real Tokyo, the present Tokyo and stood now before the entrance of the little building. A darling Japanese girl scarcely his own age, welcomed them with a shower of words all ending in -sama. Oh she was adorable, and he voice was heavenly and...
She called Youji just... Youji.
She knew him.
She also got them a table in the back room, right up against the hand painted mural. Omi wriggled his stockinged feet against his bottom and watched his companion sit down, not knowing what to expect him to say.
As for Aya, the soy sauce bathed sukiyaki was perfection. He could never get enough of that particular condiment in fact, as much as he relished the bitter tang of it.
The chopsticks were laid dainty alongside his bowl as he took his battered teacup in hand. Two dunks and a swirl and the strainer was removed. He took a sip, solemn gaze settling upon Ken, a compliment hovering on the tip of his tongue.
"Children...?"
The cup landed on the table with a soft, solid tap. It was an unexpected question -- but no more so than the fact Ken was attempting to engage him in conversation. Not something he usually did.
Nor did he ever look so...happy. At least, not in his presence.
And had his eyes always been so blue?
Aya picked up his lacquered chopsticks and began prodding the succulent bits of beef, mulling over these odd new developments; shaping his answer.
"I...suppose they're okay. If they've been taught how to behave properly." He pinched a piece of meat and held it up, letting the thin sauce coating it drip back into his bowl.
"Which they usually aren't."
He popped the morsel into his mouth.
"But why are you asking me about that?"
Ah, what a room. No sound but the wafting trill of a shakuhachi in the air. The soft glow of a white silk lantern behind a rice paper wall. A low dark table and a bit of peace.
And Omi was at his side.
Omi with the damp, calloused palms and too short fingernails.
He'd had the urge to kiss him then.
"Pretty little thing, that Eri, don't you think? She's worked here for a couple of months now..." He gave Omi a saucy wink.
"Oh, yeah! I come here a lot. Does that surprise you?" He laughed a little, raked his long bangs back from his face. "Yeah, yeah. Youji-jiichan feels the need for a bit of quiet on occasion."
So why can't I be quiet?
The fragile shadow of their waitress rose against the screen, then. A woman of Ken's age with the face of a Princess -- all cool and wise and elegant. Cranes winged their towards heaven around her blue kimono's hem.
Youji promptly fell in love.
Wordlessly, she gave them their menus and took their orders, black eyes glittering, and was soon gone on a whisper of white plum, taking a sliver of Youji's heart with her.
Just a sliver, mind: After all, it was all he could spare.
He propped one elbow up on the table and rested his chin in his palm dreamily. "Mmm...Sencha and yam soup and rice and yakitori. I didn't realize just how hungry I am." He turned to Omi with a goofy sort of smile. "And you got your cakes and sweets."
"I swear Omi, if someone were to kiss you now, they'd think you were made of sugar."
"Are you daring me to kiss the waitress?" Omi jested without full leave of his senses. If he would not have spoken then, he should have gone mad- wept without reason, laughed like an imbecile. Something. There had to be something, one small madness that kept they two in the paths of their own orbits, swinging around each other like the earth and the moon.
Guess I'm the moon...
As if willed by his raging heart, the music in the background took to it a mellifluent melancholy, the space between notes left only for tears. The other patrons could barely be made out below the sound, as if they had turned into echoes of nothing but old noise that had once come to pass between these walls: choked giggles, stern love, two girls with heavy European accents who couldn't decide what to order...
He bit his lips and glanced one more to Youji. Youji and is lovely waitresses. Youji and his lovely woman at the gym. Youji and his soap girls.
No, he doesn't need that... he's got enough as it is.
He's got me and he doesn't even care.
"Saa, I'll never be the boy you are, Youji-kun! I just... can't!" Still smiling.
"Saa, well, it's only we spend so much time together, and damnit! We only know what we don't have in common. How to get on each other's nerves. It's been years and all I've got to carry around in my little file of who Aya Is," Saying this, he tapped his forehead, "Is the same thing I've had since day one. This out of his system, he plucked another nibble from his plate, popped it in his mouth, and sucked quietly for a bit.
Where do you go Thursdays?
Why aren't you still after me about anything that happened today?
Why am I even doing this? Any of this...?
Ah well...
"Ok, so we don't quite agree on children. Me? I adore 'em, spoiled or not. There's no such thing as a bad kid in my mind. Just kids who need something else in their lives: love, discipline, ice cream. But then again, I never did get over liking rolling in the dirt, and I can't imagine you ever did!"
It could have been the firefly glow of the lanterns that inspired him. It might have been the haunting music that opened a chasm within his heart, making him remember the single chance he'd had for happiness -- had had and had lost in a heart
And then he knew. That look as far away as imaginary lands, this was the mirror of his own heart, yet worn by another. Something about the gesture though, the words, all the facets of meaning, the unsaid truths. It was as if his companion had offered himself up, soul empty and spilling, yet somehow inviting.
But what if I'm not seeing it right...? What if this is all wishful thinking? What if I'm just another girl to him... what if he's really just thinking I'm too young? Being wistful and I...
"But Youji-kun..." his words were faint as the touches of snowflakes. As his own unsaid wants began to trickle out, there seemed a casket inside him that toppled open. If this is what's happening to him than how come he... he doesn't. Overcome with the uneased sorrow so long hidden behind his smile, Omi found a few stale tears rolling down his cheeks. They joined be others; fresh, achy, and embarrassed to live. Just like the rest of him.
"What if something bad happens to me tomorrow? I don't want you to be sad, and I don't want the others to be sad if they find out but Youji... And what if I'm not what you think I am? And... I'm so sorry I'm crying I don't know what's wrong with me... I... Youji..."
To be just seventeen and to think you're going to die the next day...every day? Chikuso...
Youji reached for him, thinking at first of merely touching one trembling hand, but...It just didn't seem to be enough. Not for Omi when he was hurting so.
And not for him.
His hands slid past Omi's as his arms encircled his thin, sob-wracked body. He was as small as a doll, and felt at that moment to be just as boneless. Youji cradled him as if he might break.
The world could go to hell.
"You think I'll hate you if I know the truth? Is that it? Omi... I...don't think I could ever hate you."
He petted the thick, tousled mop beneath his chin, whispering, "And I'm not going to let anything happen to you either."
"But why?" Omi wailed softly into Youji's shirt -- the warm, black fog of cigarettes and expensive cologne he had buried his face in, as if to pretend eternal night had taken his form. "Why can't everyone hate me? Why can't I hate everyone? Why can't I be alright when I'm alone? Why am I still afraid of the dark? Why can't I hate people? Any time I try to care about anyone, they go end up crying. It's not fair, I'm not fair. I shouldn't even be here, I should just be at home doing something useful instead of ruining your shirt!"
The words trickled from his mouth, but his body refused to offer any response. He could almost feel the marionette strings of his life go limp, hearing their own names in his thoughts. Leaving him. Like everything had left him in the end.
"I'm so sorry I can't hate you Youji. I'm so sorry. That I had to do this to you. That you can't hate me either, like you should."
The sobs, which had nearly ceased, redoubled. His eyes burned even though they were closed. His ears throbbed, and that they throbbed with his companions pulse only made it worse.
"I'm sorry I've ruined everything."
"I'm so sorry I love you."
Aya sipped from his cup, leaving his hands wrapped around it after settling it on the table. The sides of it were so hot that he thought his skin would blister from the heat.
Is that how you see me?
"No, I never played in the dirt."
Ah, well...Maybe it's only fitting that you do.
"I was much too busy playing the part of heir and firstborn. Had to set an example."
But there's much more to me than what you see.
"I guess...I've always been too serious..."
I wish...
He released the cup from its flesh and bone prison and popped another tidbit into his mouth, not bothering to let the salty sauce drip away beforehand.
"Why roses, Ken?"
More than a few grains of Ken's rice went down the wrong way. He was obliged to rather hurriedly grope for his tea, which has steeped to a point of being somewhat stronger than he fancied. Was very hot. At least it scalded some sense into him.
Traces of oolong still shining on his lips as a smile wicked as a royal usurpers took them.
Well, if lying doesn't work...
"Because, Aya, a rose is a rose is a rose! Roses are nothing to be afraid of. I learned that today. I also learned that they're noble, and they're shy, at least in medieval manuscripts. That a rose is feminine thing, but strength and purity both walk hand in hand with it. Especially white roses like we almost never see here. Roses are snobs. No rose would play in the dirt. Roses are the Queen of Flowers, not the king. Roses have nothing to do with fun. Roses have so many meanings, they have none at all."
And then, wiping his mouth of both tea and the tirade of symbolism, he added. "Roses speak of things long past. Gone. Non existent."
And then he jammed his chopsticks into his rice since he had no cards to wave around to call this bluff.
"Any you, Aya, are nothing but a rose."
Then he waited patiently to bid farewell to his throat. Still smiling.
Youji's hands stilled where they lay on Omi's back, his words tripping through his mind. All the times he'd said it, never had he really meant it. Had never had it offered to him in return.
And now, again, when he did really feel it, but never dared say it...
He drew his arms a little tighter around him, his heart roaring in his ears. "You haven't ruined anything, Omi. Not anyone's lives. And being soaked with tears could never hurt this shirt."
And I know.
His hands resumed their lazy glide up and down the tense lines of his back. "I don't know about 'everyone', but you haven't done anything to make us hate you. Ken adores you; Aya too, even though you have to look a little harder at him to see it."
"As for me..."
He closed his eyes, and her sadly smiling face swam out of the shadows of his mind.
"...I'm not sorry, Omi, but I love you too."
It was as if Youji had willed him to stop weeping... or at least sobbing. A few shy tears still tumbled down his face, but the muffled cries no longer took his breath. A certain anxious numbness replaced the ache of his fear, a certain sadness more profound than joy settled in his mind. And he reveled secretly in the sensations of Youji's hands tracing out his own shoulder blades.
He didn't care one way or the out how many women those hands had touched. If anything, the memories his companions fingers bore only gave Omi a shot of mischievous glee among the wounds recalled by his battered heart.
I'm Youji's. I'm Special. I'm his only boy.
I'm a selfish little boy.
And I have no right to be proud of any of this but... A few voices of his thoughts, fed by the once-sealed images of his past, tapped the shoulders of his spirit and reminded him of a certain suspicion he had banished from his mind for so long.
That he had never heard those words before in his whole life. Or had forgotten of them. Pushed them away for the childish fear of pain and regret. Every shred of sense left to him was screaming for such caustic release to be re-instated.
But he couldn't. Not now.
There was nothing now but Youji.
Omi lifted his face from his shirt, and rubbed his nose against his companions neck. It was the only remotely sweet touch he was he knew how to perform.
Given all the facts Ken had just spewed forth about roses, Aya might have taken offense at being classified as one. Would have but for one thing: He was right.
Aya knew he was a snob, had nothing to do with fun. Even Aya-chan had had to coax him into it, something for which she'd had a knack.
He tapped at the side of his bowl with his sticks, then jammed them down into
the fluffy bed at the bottom of it. Strengt
Ken, feigning indigence in a patently false fashion, responded, ever more audaciously fastening his gaze to that enigmatic boy placed before him as if in a museum of their coy and cloying existence together. "Well, because Aya, there is!"
He let that sink in for a moment, had another swig of his tea. Watched.
"I don't know what you've been thinking, but that's the point. It's not fun living with you, Aya." A truly amiable giggle. "No need to start on that 'it's not supposed to be fun' diatribe. Fun is where you find it, but that has nothing to do with this. What does is that you have been driving me insane since we met. It was odd enough you showing up here with a girl's name and an old geezer's attitude, but it just went on and on and on. You are as constant as these damn rains if not worse! And this morning, this afternoon. Whatever, I wasn't keeping track... I got sick of it, sick of this person you are trying to pass off as you. So I went to go figure it out as best I could. But all I know about you, is totally superficial, so I had to start somewhere."
At this, he bounded from the room a moment, returning presently with one tight-nit crimson rose bud, what he continued to clasp as he sat down. Used it like a magic wand as if it's waving would bring truth to his speech.
"You know, I never went for a good mystery before this... but if you want to spoil it, go ahead. Even though I think I know you well enough, and you won't. It's fine Aya. As hard as you tried to turn me away, I still find you the most grotesquely interesting person I ever met."
It tickled Youji, that snuffling caress. Sent an awakening twinge through him. One hand ghosted over the curves and hollows of Omi's back to cup the back of his head. Stroked the sunlight bright strands, smoothed them back from his forehead to press a gentle kiss at his temple.
Satin skin and faintly scented hair. Felt the throb of his heart beneath his lips. His other hand drifted down to play across his lower back.
Youji bent his head, fingers slipping lightly across salt-water stained cheeks, lips brushing his forehead as he spoke.
Voice as soft as spring rain.
"Omi?"
"Y-yes? Youji-kun, I..." Omi struggled a moment to pick himself up, a shearly mental battle. One he ultimately lost. The kisses lingered on him in a way he supposed no motherly gesture could have. I love you not because you are mine and I am obliged to love you, but because I have chosen to. These kisses mean you are mine. At least for now. Be happy.
So instead he sighed and snuggled up closer to his companion? Did he dare thinks sweetie? No, not just yet. One thing at a time. Chances of anger could come later.
Save one, that came at once. The waitress appeared with their tea, she did not seem surprised by the tangle of their forms, she did not say anything. She winked softly and gave them a thumbs up in fact. They both chuckled a little as she hurried off.
Only to be caught by the two little girls sitting at the closest table, be it not particularly close at all. The slightly taller seemed to inquire after some certain ice cream, was refused, shook her head, and went back to her tea. For the first time her eyes glanced behind the screen that partly hindered the view of their own table.
The girl choked on her tea, said something to her blond companion, who was rather drinking instead, a champagne flute of milk.
Which ended up on the floor. Shattered.
A flurry of apologies and sweeping waitresses followed. The two girls left only a ten-thousand yen note in their wake.
Omi was hot with embarrassment then... how could they... he had only just opened his heart and now this?
Youji kissed his brow again.
"I'm glad they left then. I can make you sad on my own. But I'm not going to. Not if I can help it. I just want to be happy with you. At least for awhile. People or no people."
"Savil! Stop it, let's be sensible about this!" The elder of two small girls cried frantically somewhere in the neon sea of evening Tokyo. No one answered her, not even her companion, though the little one did stop running, returning her hand to her full control. The clubbers surrounding the, did not, however, learn fluent Gaelic, and so continued to think nothing of them.
"But I'm so scared! Oh, let's go home, please, Fiona? Please?"
"I was just about to suggest that. Come on now, lets get to a payphone, hurry."
Nods passed between then and so they slid up to a street corner hidden behind a parade of poorly parked cars. Fiona handed over fine hundred yen, saying "Now now, This is your assignment after all. I'm just here to help you since you're not used to travelling. You call."
"Right!" Savil had to dial the number twice since her tiny hands had not yet ceased shaking. Her heart indeed did not slow until the ringing on the other end had come to an end, and a bright female voice had answered.
"Moshi moshi?"
"Marlene?"
"Yes'm."
"Hi, it's me. I was just wondering if you thought I should pick up some Turkish Taffy for Edmund, since I'm out?"
A long pause, Fiona admired her nails and a passing white dog in rapid succession. Finally Marlene's voice "I'll get a three way here, one moment." Followed by some muffled dialing noises, clacking plastic.
And then a man's voice, made purposefully low and groggy.
"Rufus here."
"Oh good! It's you! I was hoping I'd get..."
"Saffie?"
"Yes, it's me." She wrinkled up her nose, since her giggles remained drowned by her dread.
"What's the matter?"
"Well, Fifi and I," (Fiona: "HEY!") "ran into Sephiroth and we're awfully spooked."
"Oh, did you now?" Falsely tired though the words were, they suddenly brimmed with gentle concern. "Well, this is the Planet after all. I'm surprised you went out at all. But, it's just taffy, and you'd sent the owls."
"Can you come get us?"
"For you, anything. In fact, you know what? There should be an oyster bar called The Walrus and the Carpenter really near where you are now. Why don't you forget the taffy, go in there, and order yourselves Shirley Temples. The owner knows me, just tell him who your Ni-chan is. I'll be right there. Don't get me anything."
"Ok."
"Watch yourselves now!"
"You too! Bai bai!"
The line went dead. Savil, her brows knotted with puzzlement, turned to her traveling companion. Walrus and the Carpenter? What's THAT supposed to mean?
Then she saw it, just across the street. "He says we're to go wait in there."
"Really?"
"And order Shirley Temples."
"You know what that means, don't you?"
"No... that's why I was asking you..."
"It apparently means were to go in there and order Shirley Temples."
They smirked and shrugged.
"I hate Antiterra."
"Me too."
For the first time in a long time, Fujimiya Ran, aka Aya, was utterly dumbfounded.
He thinks I'm a mystery?
He thinks living with me is FUN?
He...He...
Aya frowned slightly, puzzled.
"You want to...know me? You find me interesting?"
He slumped against the solid, curved back of his chair, eyes never wavering from Ken's. He was putting him on, having a joke. Had to be...
Just had to be...!
Except it wasn't like Ken to pull those sorts of jokes. He was too straightforward and honest, like a damned boy scout.
Which meant...
He lowered his eyes to the table, fearing that the sudden warmth in his cheeks was a blush. Fidgeted briefly with his cup, before letting his hands drop to his lap to twist violently at the hem of his sweater.
"It's absurd, you thinking me a mystery. But...You do as you like. You always do."
Cause you're impulsive and headstrong, and...And...
His cheeks grew even warmer.
He looked up at him again under the crimson fringe of his bangs, appearing for all the world like an embarrassed school boy.
"And I do not have an 'old geezer's attitude'."
Ken couldn't help himself. He chuckled. He almost lost some tea through his nose. His rose rolled onto the His grin went from Cheshire Cat to the more familiar Soccer Coach Encouraging Girl Who Missed a Goal. He set his cup down softly, and propped one elbow on the table, so he could lean his cheek on it, and hopefully, look even less threatening.
"OK, so maybe that's not the right word. But you are a traditional, honor obsessed samurai boy. If you were a girl, you'd be a mom-gal. Either way... I do find you very interesting! And not just because I 'like' to. Not just because I 'can'. I WANT to. I have CHOSEN to, as alien as that word sounds passing between us. And I've also chosen to be ridiculous and to act before I think sometimes. Just like I think, faulty logic or not, you've chosen to get pissed at us every chance you get. I'm cursed by my good nature, you're cursed with yours. Now, but you weren't always. You AREN'T always."
He sighed.
"You're not as bad-ass as you think you are. I know. And I guess the point of this rant is that you don't have to pretend, chose this anymore around me. I'm the detective, and I know."
He also got up from the table and flicked the door open, reaching backwards over his shoulder. "Melon sorbet cup? Between friends?"
Two years.
For two years he'd been who he was now: Sullen, vengeful Aya. Fighting and living in her name and warring internally with his real self. And for what?
Apparently, nothing.
He stared aghast at his teammate. Was he really as transparent as that?
Apparently, yes.
His hands clenched into tight, furious fists around his sweater's already mauled hem. Damn, damn, damn!
The offer of sorbet was neither refused nor accepted. Simply ignored.
"You're so smug, aren't you? Have me ALL figured out now, do you?" He glared defiantly at Ken, much like a hopelessly trapped tiger would.
"What makes you damn sure I'm not a bad ass? That I'm merely pretending?"
He took a gulp of his tea, nearly choking on it.
"And why do you even care if I am!"
Ken dropped the sorbet, which landed sideways, rolled out of its hiding place, and cracked loudly on the floor.
Much like Ken's ego, heart and possibly his sanity.
Umm... shit.
You do all this work and you still don't know any better.
You don't know any better! What about AYA!
"Because I just Do, AYA!" The yelling had been unintentional, but the volume of his voice no longer seemed inclined to obey reason over defeat. "Are you blind? Have you missed me every single day for the last... YEARS! I don't even know how many... because I have seen you, I have listened to you AYA! I have FELT you. You may live in a glass bubble like some autistic kid but just because you cover your eyes does not mean everyone else can't see you. How in the hell do you expect me to work with you all this time and NOT care about you?""
But that wasn't what he was talking about... was it... no he... he...
With grave difficulty, he swallowed his rage, smothered his creeping sadness. "To answer your question -- no bad ass is delicate as you are. And don't sit there and tell me you aren't." he shrugged, adding to himself, "Look at yourself for once. Like now." Something in him wanted to pound his head on the fridge too. For many reasons.
"You don't make me sad. And I don't care who sees us. If they can't deal with it...Too bad."
His hand daringly dipped down to graze Omi's hip, feather lightly over the curve of firm flesh behind it.
"I was right. You taste so sweet, Omi, that someone would think you were made of candy." He leered, teasing again. "I could become addicted."
His lecherous look softened then as he laughed, settling at last into a fond smile. "And I wouldn't mind that at all."
Two fingers slid under his chin and tilted it up, and he kissed him soundly, deeply.
"Shall I say it again? Hm?"
"I love you, Omi."
He let his fingers drift down the fragile, pale curve of Omi's throat, eyes locked with his, then pulled away a little, smiling still.
"Shall we eat, now? I find I'm suddenly...ravenous."
Omi stopped breathing for many seconds... he felt as if he no longer hungered for air, or water, or even light.
He felt as if his body had been left behind somewhere, perhaps never existed. And yet, his fingers crept onto his own lips, stroked the alien wetness of them. He licked them. Tasted someone else. Maybe it wasn't the first time in his life.
But it was the first time he felt like this. His entire mouth tingled as if with electric snow.
"I love you too..." this murmured but not beyond the range of hearing. "I do I..." Somehow do not like the way you said ravenous!
Oh... yes I do! I really do!
"Oh yes, Youji-kun! I'm so hungry."
Actually, he didn't know if the butterflies in his stomach were willing to give way to supper. They seemed particularly territorial beasties. But if ridding himself of them and presenting any semblance of at least polite hunger brought pain, so did scooting out of Youji's embrace... his hips lingered against him, his fingers.
In the end he scooted his own dishes over towards the other side of the table, and stayed there, his shin against Youji's.
"Itadakimasu!"
And his sipped his soup. The butterflies vanished. Only warmth remained.
Ken had gotten angry at him many times in the past, and had never had a problem with expressing his feelings. But...Never had he reacted so to anything he'd said or done.
He went absolutely still. Let the words crash and swirl around his brain. Watched.
Ken was clearly bothered by his response...And Aya...found he was bothered because he'd clearly hurt him.
Which surprised the hell out of him.
Calmly, softly, and finally, he spoke up.
"Am I blind? Yes. Have I missed you every single day since we've all lived together?" He paused, toyed with his cup, turning it around and around on the wooden table, scraping the lightly scarred surface.
"No."
He looked down at his lap then, desperately wanting to flee, but knowing it would be a grievous mistake if he did.
"Am I...delicate?" He snorted softly, and ducked his head down even more, ashamed.
"...Yeah, Ken...I am."
As for Ken, he felt as if his insides were about to pop. His fingers strained, his eyes burned. For a second or two, he became, as they said, completely gone.
He saw himself crossing the gap between him and his companion, with soft feet that barely hinted at the passage of a mouse. Now? Could he? Just like that? No, because this wasn't real- the heated liquor of his heart would not evaporate so quickly to allow such faint movements, such a fleeting smile as the dream self reached over, traced his though-silver fingers over that crimson hair -- no less and no more red in reality. He saw himself sitting on the edge of the table that had been cleared by an aesthetic whim of the dream. He saw himself consoling Aya with that simple, fearless caress he could not even manage in his brimming elsewhere. Not here in the Koneko, not here in Weiss.
And then he found himself, still exiled to his place before the fridge. How long had passed? He knew not, believed not in time anymore. Or himself, or anything he could do, except...
Make some kid smile. So he did to Aya what he would have to any other naughty boy. Even though no child had stirred so much bitter conflict in his form.
"Fine then! You stay here and you think about what you've done!"
Then he found himself totally divorced form his fancies, for now he stood rather in the gloom of the hallway outside, and rather, realizing he could not go back, he tore into his room with steps that were anything but silent.
And tried to lock the door behind him but the catch was broken. Lots of things were broken. So what?
The distant slam of a door and Aya rose to his feet.
"Oh, I know what I've done, Ken."
His eyes fell to the floor by the refrigerator. Pale green ice slowly melting amidst glittering shards of glass.
"I've made a mess."
He walked over to
"I wish..."
He scooped up the sliver sticky rag with both hands and carried it over to the waste can to shake it out; the glass pinged off the soup cans inside like rain on a tin roof. With a careless toss, the rag landed in the sink with a slurp.
"Ken?"
The cups and dishes followed, dunked into hot sudsy water and thoroughly scrubbed;
"Thank you for making dinner."
Then rinsed;
"Thank you for today."
Then set in the rack to dry.
He wiped down the counter, then the table.
"I...had fun."
The towel was folded and laid neatly on the counter. Then Aya left, the light dying with the casual flip of a switch behind him. He stepped out into the desolate hallway, his eyes automatically falling upon Ken's shut and bolted door.
Ken with a smile like peppermint ice cream.
I'm a damn fool...
"And I'm sorry."
With that, the lanky swordsman crept off to the shop.
Ken lay splayed on his mattress. Utterly still. He barely even blinked. His room remained dark save for a milky patch of streetlight residue that happened to be landing on his legs. The light on his nightstand was within easy reach, but what if the bed creaked? What if anything broke the white noise of his own hearing, the rush on the streets? The rain that had picked up again and made the half-light disintegrate around him.
What if anything interfered with his listening to Aya? He could just make out someone pattering around in the kitchen, and since it was only they two remaining in the Koneko...
What am I waiting for... I feel like some brat wanting to be spanked.
And this is besides being a total fuckwit?
But I was so sure...
You've been sure of a lot of things before, Ken.
Silence. The kitchen had gone quiet. His mind had shut up, as if even thinking the word would be like driving his claws into his own throat. He could see them placed carelessly on the chest, glinting now and then when a raindrop chose to refract a glisten to their wet sheen.
Actually, the metal was quite dull. They only appeared wet in Ken's mind.
But then his lips formed the body of the word, but not it's soul of meaning.
Kaze.
Someone descending the stairs. Down... down... down...
Aya.
And his thoughts erupted with sound.
"But I don't get it!" He wined playfully, tugging the covers up. For a hotel renown enough to hold J-leaguers, this place was freezing.
"I'm not gonna read it again just for you..." Kaze protested with equal mischief in his words. He had just read from Ada or Ardor after all, he had a right to be truly mad, but he wasn't. Being asked to repeat such a complex passage for a foolish boy like Ken...
"Then tell me where we're supposed to be in this."
"We're not IN the book. The book is about another world. Two worlds where time and space are divorced. One is called Antiterra, that's hell. Then there's Terra; Terra is kinda like heaven."
"And that's where we are now?" he said it with his words and his body, which he draped across the bare lap of Kaze.
"Now and forever. If you want."
And then he was alone again and frozen in his bed by thoughts of the first person he had even considered touching sweetly since... since...
Everything had died. Even Terra. To him at least.
But this... he had known if his thoughts ever lead down the once forgotten roads of that place, they would never return.
And what have I got to stay here for? Not Aya. I wish it was Aya! I wish I could care now... I wish this didn't make me doubt Persia. I've had what I wanted. Kaze had me and now I've finally had him. I'm a sick little boy on Antiterra...
And he knew what he had to do now.
Go back to the place he had been promised he would never look upon.
Ever again.
Tender and oh-so-luscious. Toothsome enough to drive a man insane.
And the yakitori was rather appealing as well.
The jostle of a slim hip against his, mimicking.
Youji could barely keep from touching Omi long enough to eat. A bite here, a taste there, and a hand would be on him again -- gentle and easy and slightly audacious.
Between sips of soup, he idly stroked one denim-covered thigh whilst watching his companion eat. Bites of sweet, pink frosting and fluffy cake disappearing between ivory teeth and eminently kissable lips. A whipped cloud dollop lingered at the corner of Omi's mouth, and Youji wanted to lick it away.
An arm snaked around Omi's narrow waist and Youji leaned close, and did exactly that.
A wolfish grin ensued, and Youji purred, "Utsukushii..."
He is fondling you like a doll. You should be really, really upset.
Another puff of frosting ended up on his tongue, and more or less half his face. But I'm not. I like it. He couldn't have executed the misplaced frosting any better. Youji's warm tongue fell just where he liked it...
"Utsukushii..."
Rather than return the delicate little phrase with clear words, he turned the gesture into an impromptu kiss and a barely whispered an "Iyaaaaan!" that had no more force to it that than chocolate puff.
He probably just thinks I'm letting him eat me up with his eyes. Ah! Silly Youji-kun!
Since on the rare occasion his companion would stop to take a bite of something, Omi would always let his own gaze creep along the fine, sensual lines of the Youji's body. Much the way Youji's hands kept creeping over him.
With an imperceptible gulp he returned the favor and buried his fingers in Youji's crisp, golden hair, where they tangled for a moment before hovering over his neck, and finally hiding away inside the edge of his collar.
The shop was as still, as dark as it had been when they'd come in.
And as cold, despite the valiant efforts of Aya's little space heater.
He merely sat on his stool and watched the people drift past. Fewer now than before, but just as frantic to get where they didn't really want to be -- not that he cared. He was too busy thinking about the boy behind the locked bedroom door down the hall.
The boy who always smelled like summer. The wind and the sea and new mown grass.
The chasm between them had closed for one shining hour, and he opened it up again, in one unthinking moment. Question was: Could he close it again?
Could he clean up his mess?
He knew he'd die inside for sure if he didn't try.
The stool creaked softly as his weight left it. Stocking feet padded down the hall, pausing before Ken's forbidding door. He stroked the smooth surface. Green colored and cool to the touch, it was. The knob fitted comfortably in his palm. He drew his hand away, and, swallowing the choking knot of fear in his throat, raised it up and knocked timidly.
Then firmly.
"...Ken?"
The knock sounded like a sudden death knell in his heart. For a split second he prayed above all things he had drifted off, and that this would be Omi or Youji's voice... the old woman who owned the shop... Manx! Even Schuldich and Crawford bearing blades would have been more welcome.
Because Aya's voice crushed him completely and utterly.
At first, like the brat he believed he was at heart, he rolled over and covered his head with the pillow, dousing his lungs with the stifling, hot air above his mattress. But almost at once he realized by moving, the springs of his bed had creaking, betraying his life, or what unwanted moments of it remained before it's destined rebirth. There...
Seconds, minutes dragged on and he said not, shuddered not even though he wanted to. Another fancy came to him: one that had him giving up utterly, beckoning that stranger he had lived with for so many days into his room. And somehow, he was different, he was not Aya but whoever had made himself Aya. And they held each other and...
Inevitably, Terra returned. Like the refrain of a familiar song. And all the hopelessness, all the irony, all the cursed reality of... reality burned away. Aya did not care anything for him. Persia did not care anything for him.
If you doubt Persia, you will end.
Kaze hadn't cared about anything. Not Ada. Not Time. Not Ken.
"Oh go away already!"
But whether the cry was meant for his memories or whoever stood outside his door, he knew not.
He just wanted them all to go away before anyone realized that his locks were broken. Those on his door, his mind, and anything else that had originally belonged in the hell of the real world.
Aya'd almost left upon hearing Ken's snapped command. But he couldn't: Couldn't leave the door, leave him, forget him. Ken, who'd kept him from feeling so...empty.
He laid his head on the door, eyes closed, and tried to think of something to do or say that would inspire him to open the door and open himself. And then...
The knob turned in his hand and the door swung open on its own. Aya nearly tumbled in, but caught himself at the last in a flurry of feet and elbows.
His face grew warm over being less than graceful for once, but it seemed it didn't matter. Ken was oblivious to him; to the room; to the world.
He studied his supine form, frowning. More angry at himself than at Ken. Hated himself all over again for being a fool and acted accordingly.
"Ken? I want...to talk to you." He took a cautious step towards the bed, lip snagged briefly between his teeth.
"I...There...I have something I want to say..."
So please let me say it and please listen...
Fucking latch...
Ken fumed wordlessly into his mattress and nearly suffocated himself by pulling the pillow tighter against his head. He heard its case rip.
Fucking pillowcase...
He was just about to pick himself and banish the red and ivory ghost from his room, breath deprived or not. The pillow ended up in the corner.
Fucking Aya!
He'd taken the breath to send him away and stopped. He could barely make out his companion against the glaring light of the hall. Just a thin silhouette. Black. Just like the comforting hollow of his bedroom. Something his eyes could focus on.
But fucking Aya closed to door behind him, and Ken's eyes slid back into their dusky vision. And got a good look at his face. The purple eyes that didn't want to focus on anything, the shivering lashes, the sad and tiny lips.
How can you do this to me you...
You can't possibly be here to apologize, not that I... I...
The notion was so ridiculous, he smiled.
A little, warm smile with none of the bitterness he felt. He just had to see where this went. Coaxing a bit, he cocked his head to one side, bemused, amused, somewhat absorbed by the look that wasn't quite falling on him.
At last he sat up, and offered with a meekness that surprised even him. "Go on, Aya."
A swirl of strawberry and Omi's mouth -- hot and trembling and slick. Youji felt like moaning. Felt like...
A bite of chicken, a sip of tea and he lost another fraction of his control. Both arms around him, holding him close, and his lips on Omi's throat. Open-mouthed and warm to the hollow. He could feel his heart throb.
Felt an answering ache lower down. A demanding ache.
Imagined Omi's hands on him, and he gasped.
"Omi," he whispered, sliding upwards to graze an earlobe with his teeth. "I'm starving..."
"I need to...eat..."
So much for wanted a direct partner who did say things like that... Omi's inner voice sighed.
Oh, who am I kidding! It's cute!
And then, he did moan himself. Because everything was going by in a blur of sugar, cake, streetlights and kissed on his neck that made him want to scream? No...
...because he was happy beyond all human words. This day, dying as it was, had been one endless gift, unwrapping itself once second at a time, minute by minute, hour by hour, cake after cake.
He ground his teeth and clenched his eyes close as if stricken. Youji-kun! Don't you know how sensitive my neck is!?
"You know," he sighed slowly, his breath all strawberries and chocolate. "I'm only seventeen. But I heard someone say that's the most perverse age there is."
His usual, innocent smile... "And I'm very hungry too!" ...Juxtaposed with the indisputable fact, he grabbed Youji's hand and slid it down the front of his own pants. His companion was right; waitresses be damned!
Youji was shocked...In the nicest way anyone could ever be shocked. After all, his hand was currently wrapped around the most delectable bit of flesh it had ever touched.
He let his thoughts show on his face.
"Ah...Yes...! Omi..." he dipped his head to dab at his ear with the tip of his tongue. "Just what I was wanting. But we must do it properly, hm?"
He slid his hand out with a faint scratch of nails on his lower stomach, catching Omi up and rocking back to stretch his legs out, settling him in his lap.
"Got to make you comfortable, Omi-kun, or you won't enjoy this...And I want you to enjoy this..."
Those lips found the slope of Omi's throat, suckling gently, licking, as his hand made a downward tug of the zipper, a loosening pull of a button. Once more he was in and around him, stroking the hardening, pulsing length with abandon.
If anything had surprised Omi, it was the fact in all of this, he hadn't balked... well, not since the careless fondling began. Great, so all the sexual frustration I've ever felt is going to come out... now!...
That one rueful inclination ended somewhere near Youji's hand as it flicked him in a particularly decadent manner. Omi managed to swallow that small groan, and followed it with a gasp. His hips twitched forward, all out of alignment and it took him a moment to settle them back into the crux of Youji's thighs. Then he whispered to him, "I... I hate to be a pain, but could you pull the screen over? Just in case I..." He grinned horribly in between his rapid breaths that were chilling his teeth with the heady aroma of Youji -- cologne, tea, cigarettes, his skin.
"I'm going to get to tell everyone I had my first time in a teahouse, someday... not right away I..." Another moan. He silenced it though.
By wrenching Youji's head forward and burying his mouth against those stunned lips.
Aya cleared his throat, coughed a little, and steeled himself to hold Ken's gaze.
"Well...I wanted to say..."
Do you know what you do for me?
"...How much I appreciate..."
I'm hopeless with people, but I wasn't always. Not so much so...
He frowned slightly, feeling so stupid. Knew he was making an ass of himself, and cringed inside.
"...No, that's not it. Not all of it. Not what's important."
And I do know what is important, even though I don't let on like I do...
"Ken...I'm...I'm sorry."
Ken sighed and hung his head, shook his head. Nothing seemed inclined to chase away the billowy shame that clouded his vision. Or the darkness.
Aya, standing there alone, stammering, apologizing to me in the dark...
He finally reached over and turned on the light. They both winced, but at least it wasn't at each other. With the last of his energy, he temporarily put away all cozy satin thoughts of Terra.
Because they'll never need me there... or anywhere else, and I'm seldom wanted here. But for now...
There's just one thing. This. Him.
"It's alright, Aya. I guess I'm sorry too but I... I really do... I really do think that the real you would be OK if he came out. I promise I wouldn't do anything to him." He sighed, and patted the edge of the bed beside him. "If you want. I understand if you just wanna get a bath and go to bed, got nothing else to say."
Youji met Omi's assault with a muffled cry of surprise, but he didn't pull away. Simply pulled him closer, timed the easy thrust of his tongue in the blond's mouth with the stroke of his hand. Miming a more intimate act...
He'd done such things in public before, but never in a teahouse, with the threat of discovery so close. Such danger made it that much more erotic for him. Sent his heart tripping.
But not as much as Omi did.
He rocked his hips against the boy's ass, and promptly bit back a moan.
The speed of his hand increased only the tiniest bit, a maniacal gleam in his eye as he looked down at him. "I don't think you want me to stop this just to move a screen, do you Omi-kun?"
He bent over him again, and captured his lips in a bruising kiss.
"I guess..." Omi began before diving into another kiss. "I guess..." He had to take another one or cry out. "I guess I don't!" That came as a hoarse sigh.
His impulse to wriggle was become more and more compelling, driving... almost painful.
I can't just rub myself on Youji's shirt! He'd think he wasn't doing anything for me... he'd think...
Omi exhaled sharply and perched his chin on Youji's shoulder, his lips tantalizingly close to his ear, just hovering before it.
"I guess I couldn't have asked for this to be any better..." a laugh, "This is the most wonderful place and the most wonderful you. I guess you think I'm not getting off on the fact we're not alone. Youji-kun you don't know but I always had fantasies about someone watching, or being there, or holding my head." He had to stop for another depthless kiss. "And to think this morning you didn't even know I liked boys! What a nice surprise, huh? I didn't know you did either but I'm so glad."
He stopped a moment, leaning backwards and bringing his hands up between him and Youji... whose eyes didn't seem to want to focus on his own. Probably because they were so fraught with sexual no good of all sorts. He took a moment to tweak the stiff nipples under his companion's shirt. "Tell me what you want when you're finished with me?"
At Ken's invitation, the tension that had overtaken Aya relented. His shoulders drooped in relief. With a small nod, he wandered over to the bed, and perched on the edge of it. Bent arms propped up on his knees and head bowed a little.
It didn't really occur to him where he was exactly. Only that Ken was there. And Ken wouldn't hurt him.
But then, in his heart of hearts, he had always known that -- and it frightened him a little.
His hands tightened around his arms, voice a murmur.
"For dinner...For the library...For...Listening -- Thank you."
Ken smiled then. An unsullied grin and the most inviting he could muster. He also leaned down at an awkward angle so he could get a look at Aya's face. Let him see that he was utterly free of aggression, of anything but a gentle welcoming.
"Woul you're welcome, Aya. I'm glad I made you feel better. Nasty rainy days like this... and hell, I wasn't any help at first! But I can listen. And I will. Alright. I know I'm a real jerk sometimes, but hey, I owe you. You deserve it. Don't let anyone tell you that you don't."
He paused then. This is more than making amends, isn't it? Even though it's too late, and you know so much. About Aya. Yourself. Terra. Leaving.
No wonder I'm all choked up.
But don't stop now... don't leave now. You have to make sure... before you go.
"It's alright, Aya. I promise."
Youji bit back a gasp at the touch of Omi's fingers on his chest. Maddening. He was on the edge...
And was promptly driven off it by his question.
"What do I want?"
His breathing was ragged now. He leaned in, whispering, "I want to lay you down and strip you and take you. Be in you. Thrust over and over into you, and hear you moan my name."
"But first...I have to take care of you..."
Easily, as if Omi were made of frothed egg whites and air, Youji pushed him back onto the cushions, and slithered down him like a snake. Parted his sprawled thighs and rested there. Lips hovering above the apex.
"I think you'll like this better..."
With careful fingers, he drew him out, and inched his lips over the weeping tip of his sex and down with one smooth stroke, tongue pressing hard against him.
Omi had to laugh to keep from screaming, since kissed were denied him at the moment, at least his mouth. "You wouldn't do that to a boy on his first date even, would you?"
A moment spent with his fist in his mouth.
"I guess I'm no boy then. That sounds fine to me... Someday, if not right now I... oh... ohhhhhhhh... Youji... Youji please..." sitting up somewhat, he ruffled his companion's bangs and reached for his nipples again. "How's that?" he knew at least he was enjoying moaning, but he'd never been moaned to himself ever before. "Hmmmm...mmmm... you think I wouldn't like to do the same to you? This? Having you on the kitchen table in the Koneko with Aya and Ken in the next room getting drooled on by schoolgirls? I..."
His speech ended prematurely with gasp as came. A lot sooner than he'd been meaning to, but the sensation otherwise. silences him, sent him slumping back onto the pillows, licking his lips and gasping for air.
He just hoped for the waitress to hold off on the check.
He, maybe that's what they do here. Wait.
But the tenderness that had flown him in the midst of his desire returned, and he sat up, pushing Youji away a moment to zip his pants back up, and then pulling him back, holding him as if he'd fallen in battle. It only felt a little strange, not because they were in such a quiet little teahouse.
But because Youji was so much taller than him, and still looked so sweet, slumped in his arms.
"Still love me?"
Aya locked eyes with Ken, simply stared as if weighing his words, his options. Then, he sat up, and ran a hand over his face.
"I don't know where you want me to start. I guess...I'll just start talking. Ask questions if you want."
"Aya's not my name." He snorted softly, peeking at him from the corner of his eye. "I guess you figured that out, though."
"Anyway...Aya is my imouto. My name is...Ran."
Ken's most natural response was, unfortunately, the one that happened to pop out.
"Hi Ran, I'm Ken. Pleased to meet you." To cover the silly little slip, he was obliged to pull a dumb grin and wave. No, that probably made things worse. Too late.
It's already too late. I could have left tonight if I'd really wanted to.
You bastard! How can you think like that?
Nothing for Ken had ever gone just right. It was only that for the first time he wasn't helplessly fingering some gaping hole in his heart where the best laid plans were supposed to be.
So I never really thought you'd do this for me...
Well then, what did I think?
Nothing, I was just hoping.
"Tell me about Aya." Because it's pretty obvious you adore something now...
I'm glad.
The taste of Omi lingered in his mouth, clung to the corners of his lips, and Youji swiped his tongue greedily to catch the last traces of it. Savoring it.
Oh, yes, he was sweet. Inside and out. Heart and soul and body.
And he was all his.
The desire in his eyes faded to a flame, still stoked by the suggestion of him on a table, with that wondrous mouth working him, schoolgirls and teammates just around the corner.
Oh, that they would definitely have to try.
He lifted a finger to stroke the full curve of his cheek.
"Aa, Omi. I still love you."
He shifted in his arms just enough to kiss him tenderly, ruffling his hair.
"And as for the rest...Whenever you're ready. Okay?"
Cause the last thing I want to do is make you uneasy. Make you feel used.
You swallow... you spend all your time with women and you swallow.
Omi's face was all wonderment. He tugged Youji closer like a teddy bear, snuggled his nose to his companion's neck. "Well," he began whispering into his ear once again, this time letting the very tip of his tongue dart out over the edges of his earring. "we don't want to give this lovely place to bad a reputation. We want to be able to come back and do this again. How about we save that for another night, and the kitchen table? And for now I'll just return the favor?"
He provided no time to answer, but rather took one fleeting glance around to make sure no one in particular was watching, fumbled the flush in his cheeks which had arisen in thoughts of what he had done and what he was about to do, flipped Youji over and went for his zipper.
Once well ensconced between his companion's legs and holding the elusive bit of metal, he leaned on one hand, and smirked wildly, hoping for some sort of complaint about what appeared to be his recent spell of misbehavior.
Aya'd froze at the use of his name. It had been ages since he'd heard it. And, the flip way Ken had replied...Aya very nearly left. Had spent the whole of the following silence debating on whether or not to do that...
And then, he'd asked the magic question. The reason for everything.
Aya.
Eyes narrowed a touch suspiciously, expecting another sly remark about her, Aya began his tale.
"I always think about the bad things, so much so, that I nearly forget the good. I have to force myself to remember; it all gets buried."
"She wanted to be nurse. Had the brains for it. She wanted to go to school in England, and I worked two jobs, trying to get the money to send her. Scholarships only go so far."
And her smile was like the dawn to me...
He swallowed then, forcing back his grief, and huddled miserably in his own embrace.
"But none of that matters anymore."
Aya working two jobs... why doesn't this picture want to go together in my head. He works two jobs now... in a way but...
One of his crimson ear tails shifted invitingly, despite the way Ay -- ... Ran had curled up around himself. Ken had to clench the leg of his jeans to keep from brushing it away.
I'd wished my whole life I had brothers or sisters. Little ones. I don't know what I wouldn't do for one now. And he had one? With a pretty name. One who wanted to help people instead of slicing them up...
So you didn't want that either. Not to start with. Did you?
Well, here goes my speech on dead people...
It was actually a rather pleasant, poetic little bundle of lines he used on the forlorn children who showed up for soccer, still sniffling and bearing pictures of their dead rabbits and mothers. And something he truly believed. About memory. But he started with...
"No... why would you turn yourself into her if your memories of her didn't matter? No matter what they are..."
It wasn't what Youji had expected, being thus treated -- not that he was complaining. More like pleasantly surprised, and shocked at being so pleasantly surprised twice in one night.
The weight of his hand made him roll his hips forward, twitch against Omi's hand in silent pleading. His eyes fell on those rosy lips, and he felt his mouth go dry. It was too much to bear.
Omi could make him into a slave with just a look, and Youji loved it.
He arched into his touch, stretching, hands coasting over his hair, his shoulders, his arms.
"Omi...Do it...Please..."
Well, there it goes... "You said my name!" Omi found himself truly delighted at the revelation. Now safe and satisfied himself, his compulsion to please returned, and he decided at once we would enjoy this even more than what had been done to him.
He said nothing, but gingerly at first swept the wetness from Youji's achy tip... and then made him watch as he licked his fingers rather than anything else. His own eyes followed those watching him all the way down. Out of sight where he began with a few nimble and distinctly wet kisses. And then he stopped.
Licked his lips. Licked Youji. Curled his lips over his teeth and took just the very tip into his mouth.
And rolled it around with his tongue like a lollipop.
You give me candy, you get candy ^_^.
"Oh, my memories matter to me. All of them. They give me a reason to do what I do. What I have to do. But...Everything she wanted, that I wanted to give her: It all seems so pointless now."
Aya unwound his long limbs, and sat back a little, glancing over at him. "She's not dead, Ken--not in the sense of cemeteries and prayers and incense, that is. Aya's neither here or there. When she comes back, I don't know that she'll remember me. Sometimes...I hope she doesn't."
"What I am now, what I've done...Aya must never know."
Sudden wasn't the word. It weaved into him slowly, one realization after another, and the sort of quite unraveling of everything came as a dim, serene light on his face. That's where Aya went. This was why he had a girl's name. Why he looked so lost. How he could kill without looking back and still seem so the friend of the papillion noir. And no one else.
You're one little knot of separation anxiety, aren't you? Oh Ran, Aya, Whatever, I don't blame you. Do you think that I do? That anyone does.
I'll remember you even if she doesn't.
"Ran, this isn't forever. We won't always have to do this, we won't always have to remember we even did this, not as clearly as we do now but... yes it will be there, behind us. But it won't always hurt. Not like this. She shouldn't know. She doesn't have to."
Frankly, none of us should have known in the first place.
With lids drawn shut, Youji lay on cushions of cream satin, spread and exposed and brazenly toyed with by the most beautiful boy he'd ever seen.
Tsukiyono Omi-kun. HIS Omi.
Oh, but it was good, so damn good, that tongue of his lapping at the tip of him as if it were a sweet.
He was better than any woman he'd ever had.
Youji brought a hand down to pet his hair again, fighting back the urge to thrust forward a little into that wet heat. His head lolled to the side with a gasp. Not yet...Not yet.
When he spoke at last, it was more or less like a soft, quiet moan, fingers ruffling.
"Omi...Omi. All mine...And I...Ahhh..."
Omi smiled around his lover and inched upwards ever so slightly to catch his fingers in his hair. And then it was all he could do to sink down a bit, taking him a little deeper than before in penance for having shifted away.
He couldn't seem to stop smiling.
A possessive little smile no less. I'm yours, you're mine. Maybe everything's where it belongs. At least for now.
Part of him wanted to reach down far enough to nuzzle Youji's fuzz with his nose, but every time he tried, he felt him self start to gag a little and had to edge back again. He knows I'm am amateur. He'll understand... won't he?
Well, not in his dreams was he an amateur, but here, now. Pleasing a corporeal body that he had no control over...
He gave a little nibble with his lips and slid his hands over Youji's thighs and onto his ass, giving it a good grope.
They were pretty words meant to comfort, Aya knew it. But they were wrong. Ken was wrong.
He wished with all his heart that he hadn't been.
"Won't always have to do this, hm? So sure, aren't you?" Aya shifted on the bed, turning more towards him and away from the door, "Oh, no, Ken. We're Kritiker's prized cats, and they won't ever let us go."
"Besides, do you think you could stop doing what we do, when innocents might suffer and villains go free to live and terrorize if we did quit? Would your sense of justice let you do it?" He gave him a slow shake of his head. "I couldn't. Even when she wakes up, I know that in this world, there would be some other danger waiting to befall her. Another car in the night gunning for her. I let her down once, Ken. I can't let her down again. Not when she's -- "
The words froze on the tip of his tongue, so wrong and false.
All I have left...?
...But...That's not right...
I have more...
A sound came, too low for human ears -- that of a veil ripping away from Aya's eyes.
She's not all I have left.
Right there in front of me for two fucking years...And I...Won't ever let you down either.
And he saw the truth of things in a wondrous and terrifying moment, and filled with the rainbow twinkling joy of it, he forgot about Aya and became simply Ran.
He smiled, albeit slightly.
"Arigatou, Ken."
With that, he rocked forward on his knees and kissed him.
"You're a bad, bad boy, Omi-kun..."
Youji wriggled his fingers against his scalp, stroking. A breathy little chuckle which dissolved into a gasp. Voice a silk sheet sigh.
"Not that I'm complaining..."
He thrust forward then, just a little, just enough, then withdrew. A gentle roll like a wave.
"I don't want to hurt you."
Another tiny hitch.
"I don't want to spoil that pretty mouth."
It was building and building at a crawl between his legs. Deceptively slow, almost unexpected.
Almost.
He flexed his fingers in his hair.
"Pretty Omi..."
I never dreamed I would like being called a bad boy...
But I do. I really really do!
He pulled away for just split second and whispered, "I'm your bad boy. All yours."
That moment between licks he took to mop the inside of his lips with his tongue... they were but the tiniest bit slit, and he'd done it himself. Will my kisses be bloody? Oh god, I hope not... I hope I...
He detected a certain shift in the muscles his tight lip embraced. Ready? Ok Youji... now please hold still...
Thinking this, he took a deep breath and leaned over his lover's sex, half swallowing it. Youji's hips bumped him in the shoulders, traces of salt appeared on the back of his tongue. And the longest sigh then drifted on the air.
He pulled up, mopping the last of his lover's orgasm up with his tongue.
"Pretty Youji." And smiled, leaning indolently on his thigh.
On his back, with nothing but a teahouse ceiling above him, was the last place Youji had expected to find himself that evening.
But ah! He was in bliss.
He adjusted his clothing, and sat up, hooking his hands under Omi's arms and hoisting him up for a languid kiss.
"I hadn't thought of you swallowing. I had wanted to spare that mouth of yours." Another tiny kiss. "Mmm...That delectable mouth."
He pulled him close, stroking his back and nibbling delicately at his ear. Silently damning the clothes that barred his hands from Omi's skin. If they had been alone...
"Omi-kun," Youji purred, "how about I pay the check and we go home?"
Omi didn't exactly answer the question. Instead, he rather tugged away and yawned with unintentional drama. "Ok, Youji-kun. I'm sorry. I'm very sleepy. And then he added with a evil little grin, "Which isn't entirely your fault..."
But then he shook his head and climbed to his feet, offering one of his hot little hands to his companion. He looks all small and shy, kneeling like that when I'm up here... There beside the table that was dappled with teacups and cake crumbs. To think no one who ever sat in this booth would ever be free from the sexual nuances, at least in their two minds. Everyone would be intruding on their special place... or would it be that they two have rather spilled some essence here, left traces of their energy.
He yawned again. It was too much to think of at this hour.
They made their way to the front, hand in hand, silent save for sighs. The two ladies at the counter, Eiri was one of them, thanked them as if nothing had happened, looking up from a leaf of pink paper they had both been pondering over as opposed to watching. It seemed out of place for such a traditional place... no matter. So he would be home with his Youji.
Watching Aya... no, watching Ran speak had been like watching a child tugging its way through the grass after a butterfly. The words he heard, and understood, but there was something intangible that crept along after them, so that the words became not half of what was said. Something between darkness and light that shaded and shifted all over Ran... the ghost of Aya? Ken didn't believe in ghosts. Aya didn't know death.
And then whatever it had been, it somersaulted away into the light and Ran shimmered there in the glow of the lamp. This was no chilly glee of knowing, as Ken had begun to think of it.
Don't say such things, Ran. Don't tell me this is forever. Don't tell me you're a prisoner... you aren't O and I'm not either, anymore. You're not Sir Stephen, unless you are to yourself. But Ran, please stop. Please Ran, I can feel you hurting even if you don't.
But then the shimmer became clear. Ran smiled. Ken's lips drifted apart in surprise.
And then Ran kissed them.
It was such a little kiss... tiny, shy. But not frail, or innocent. Just their lips brushing, the feel of their breath on each other. Nearness, without surrender. The sort of motion expect of some naiad doomed to vanish once it had been completed.
Ken answered, tilting forward towards his companion taken with visions of their past for only a split second: seizing him by the arms when he would dive like a madman after Takatori, the furtive glances. You're cursed by your good nature.
Am I! One of his hands fell lightly on Ran's breast, and the other caressed his ruby locks. But only for a moment. He held him away. Not pushed, not rejected, not turned away. Just put him where he could look into his eyes as he spoke.
A single grain of a wish had turned into a pearl brighter than the moon in his thoughts. "Ran I... I want to give you something, but you have to trust me, OK?"
And if this works, we'll both be saved.
His lips still smarted from the kiss. Hurt in the nicest sort of way. Ran hoped the pain would never end.
But you let me stay and listened so patiently to my nonsense.
The spectral brush of his fingers down Ken's arms, his thighs, as Ran drew his legs up under him again.
And you let me kiss you.
He didn't want to let him go.
You've already given me the best sort of gift I've ever had, but...
"All right."
Not a sound, not a spark of light greeted them when they entered the building, much to Youji's unreserved glee. No Ken. No grumpy Aya. Just him and his Omi -- who was currently curled up in his arms, head against his shoulder.
His Omi. It had hit him in the car just how quickly it all had happened. So quickly. Never had that happened in all his life, but he didn't regret it.
He hoped Omi wouldn't either.
Youji rubbed his cheek against the silky golden strands as he wove his way down the hallway and up the stairs to their respective rooms.
But which one to take? Would Omi even want him to stay for the night?
He glanced down at the warm, appealing bundle in his arms with a wry smile.
"Omi?" he whispered. "Wake up. We're home."
There had been dreams of scaled beasts in business suits. Of darkness and of dank that came to him the moment his eyes had fallen closed on the way home. And he had shuddered, between deep, grey rest and the gleaming catacombs of fancies. But something in him, after all these months, had finally lashed out and driven away the nightmares. He watched, a mere beholder of his own spectacle.
One of pink, icinged tarts battling the apparitions of his dread. If he had been hovering in wakefulness, he should have been an inert, ethereal being.
Tied to an ivory tower in the middle of Nagara!? Wearing a dress...
He looked back on it and laughed. Especially when Youji came in, riding on one of the tarts, not to mention wearing a somewhat lewd cowboy get up.
And then he found himself awake... or between dreams. "I do' wanna. I'm so slyeepy Youji. I love yu. Jus' hol' me."
Stillness. He mistook his body for a feather since he felt nothing below or above. Just a cloud of adoration beside.
"Lemme sleep in your be'. I'm sowwy."
"You're sorry? That's funny, because I'm not."
Youji grinned down at the drowsing Omi, and sailed gracefully into the room with him, straight to his queen-size, 350 thread count sheet covered, black silk throw pillow-laden bed. Just the sort of set up a comfort-loving, master seducer would have in his room.
Except -- seduction was the last thing on his mind right then.
He lowered Omi's legs to the floor, and the covers went back with a careless flick of a wrist. Stretched Omi out and divested him of his sneakers and jeans, himself of his all his clothing, and climbed in next to him.
Arms around him and nuzzling.
A slow, tender kiss and a smile.
A breathless sigh in the dark.
"I love you too, Tsukiyono Omi. Oyasumi."
He spoke slowly then... and low, though he felt no one around who might be listening. No one could ever be too sure. His words were earnest, neither fierce nor patronizing, nor lewd. He made them just a bit sweet. Something offered, maybe small gifts on their own.
"Well, I have to give it to you tomorrow, if that's alright. And there are a few things you should do if you want before you get it. It can't hurt either of us... but if I explain why, I'll spoil it."
He smiled and smoothed Ran's hair behind his ear... the long locks seemed to call to his hands.
"Go to bed early tonight and sleep as well as you can, alright? And you should probably visit Aya tomorrow, even though it isn't the right day of the week. I have to get up early myself, so I'll probably be gone by the time you wake up."
As if in early apology, He then leaned closer, and whispered to Ran's lips. "You can meet me at the library at noon. We can walk to where we're going."
And kissed his softly on the brow. "Sleep well now, OK?"
You are acting very mysterious. But then, that's what you said you liked. Mysteries.
And you said I was a mystery...
A smile tugged at his lip at that.
"All right." A lingering kiss upon Ken's mouth and Aya was gone from the bed. Door opening and closing, and whispering footsteps down the hall.
His arms ached with emptiness, but he forced it back as he forced open his own door.
Clothes landed on the floor in a haphazard line all the way to the bed, and Aya slid beneath the sheets with a sigh.
He had the feeling that it would be the last time he would ever sleep in that bed.