Linkage:
Rain
~~~~
Two weeks later.
Aya stood outside Yohji's door for a good ten minutes before finally twisting the handle. He'd thought about knocking, but he didn't want to announce himelf. Didn't think Yohji wanted to talk to him. But he needed to talk, badly, and gut instinct told him Yohji did too.
Or maybe he was just running away again, unable to face being honest when confronted with Ken and Omi's naivete.
He didn't know how to start the conversation, either. Hopefully Yohji would be some semblance of his usual chatty self. Otherwise they might end up sitting and staring at each other silently.
It was dark in Yohji's room. The curtains were closed, allowing only a thin edge of light in above the curtain rod. In the time it took for Aya's eyes to adjust, he made his way carefully to the side of the bed. Yohji's eyes were open, naked without their glasses, watching him. The white bandages wrapping his shoulder and chest seemed to glow faintly in the dim light. Standing beside the bed, Aya folded his arms defensively across his chest and waited for Yohji to say something.
Yohji looked away, toward the window, and sighed faintly. "Here to remind me how stupid I was, Abyssinian?"
Aya shook his head. "No," he said softly. "I'm the idiot. I put you all in danger."
Turning his head, Yohji frowned at him. "Sit, will you? There's a chair there... somewhere... under the clothes."
Nodding, Aya pushed a heap of clothes off a vaguely chair-shaped object and discovered a surface large enough for him to sit on. Sinking down onto it, he laced his fingers together and leaned his elbows on his knees. Leaning slightly forward, he studied his intertwined fingers. "Yohji," he began.
"Why?" Yohji asked before Aya could get his thoughts in order. "Why the hell didn't you just... I don't know... say something?"
"Like what?" Aya said tiredly, looking up at him. "That I was tired... that I needed... something?"
Yohji's fingers knotted in the sheet. After a moment, he laughed shortly. "No, I mean... Shit. Was that... what this was about?"
Aya ran his tongue along the edge of his teeth before replying, "Sex?" For a wonder, his fair skin didn't betray him with a blush.
Yohji caught his gaze and held it. Aya tried not to squirm and struggled not to look away. After a moment, Yohji shook his head slightly and reached blindly for his night-table.
"Your smokes aren't there," Aya said.
Curling his fingers in a ball, Yohji dropped his hand back in his lap. "I know. Habit. It wouldn't kick in if this weren't so damn awkward a situation."
Aya smiled, surprising them both. "So how do we make it less so?"
Shrugging, Yohji leaned his head back against the wall. "Honesty is always awkward, ne?"
"I suppose."
Silence crept out of the corners and claimed the room again. Aya dropped his gaze back to his fingers, listening to the small sounds of Yohji breathing. The soft sound of rain against the window was a strangely soothing counterpoint.
"Tell me something," Yohji said, startling Aya.
"Nani?" Glancing up, Aya realized Yohji was studying the ceiling, not him.
"What happened, the other night, when you walked out on Ken?"
Aya frowned. "Meh... I was washing the dishes... Ken had marinated mushrooms... left the soy sauce in the bowl..."
Yohji rolled his head sideways and quirked his eyebrows at him. "I got that part."
"It looked like blood... spreading in the water," Aya said softly.
"Oh."
Blowing out a sigh, Aya shrugged. "So I took off. And it just got worse from there. Rain... an accident... the lights flashing... blood dissolving in the gutters."
"And Schuldich?" Yohji asked, almost gently.
It took every ounce of willpower he had not to throw himself out of the chair and stalk out the door, but Aya restrained himself. Folding his arms tightly across his chest, he tried to unclench his jaw. "Found me... in the rain. Dead-end alley."
Yohji waited, his face devoid of emotion.
"Alright," Aya snapped. "Yes. I let him fuck me."
Yohji's turn to sigh. "I wasn't going to ask that." He dropped his gaze to the sheet and watched his fingers twist the sheet nervously.
"Your face did," Aya said, reining in his temper. "What about you?"
"Oh... I..."
"Don't tell me he didn't..."
Yohji flushed and refused to meet Aya's eyes. "No, he didn't... fuck me." His voice dropped, the words becoming so soft Aya had to strain to hear. "Just... ah... in the club... with his mouth..."
"Oh," Aya said. He hadn't been ready to hear that. It was his petty need to even the score that got a hold of his tongue. If only he could tell Yohji that. "I... uh... Shit. Gomennasai."
Yohji shrugged and laughed, the false, careless playboy laugh that Aya hated to hear from him. "Doesn't matter. It was just part of his game, right? To make me follow you?"
Aya frowned, his mind skipping back over his encounters with Schuldich. Something wasn't adding up. There was an obvious connection that he wasn't making, and Aya had a feeling that when he did, it was going to hit him with the force of an emotional cement truck. "What," he began, groping for the words. "What... did he... tempt you with?"
The look Yohji shot him was surprised, but also relieved, Aya thought. Yohji closed his eyes, leaning his head back against the wall again with a light thump. "Darkness," he said finally. "You?"
The cement truck hit, plowed him flat, and left him to pick up the bruised and battered pieces of himself. Moving as quietly as he could, he got up and sat down on the edge of the bed. Yohji's head jerked forward, his eyes snapping wide open as Aya took his hand. Licking his lips, Aya said, "Warmth."
"Aya," Yohji breathed.
The overwhelming urge to spontaneously kiss someone was not something Aya was accustomed to feeling. He ran his tongue lightly over his lips and tried not to stare at Yohji's.
"Aya," Yohji said again, firmly this time. "You... Did you really think that we -- that I -- wouldn't understand what you were feeling? Did you really think we couldn't sympathize? That we wouldn't get it? C'mon, Aya! None of us do this because we enjoy it. All of us have blood on our hands. You're not the only one who has a past, a history, a reason to fight --"
"I know," Aya said softly. A week ago, he would have stormed out of the room rather than confess to feeling anything, but the cement truck had been a rather rude wake-up call. "And I know... you care..." The word felt odd in his mouth, but he forced it out, because Yohji did care, had to care -- about him -- or he never would have gone out looking for Schuldich. "I just..." He shook his head.
"You didn't want to admit that you were just as vulnerable as the rest of us," Yohji said carefully. "But you didn't even ask, didn't even try... You just believed every lie Schuldich tempted you with."
Aya stiffened. That was going a little too far. "He was in your head, too, wasn't he? It's not as simple as that!"
"Did you fight it?" Yohji asked, unmoved by Aya's sudden flare of temper.
"Did you?" Aya glared.
Yohji met his glare levelly. "We argued. I was half-way drunk. He took advantage of it."
Aya's anger deflated with a rush. "Oh." It was hard to stay angry when Yohji insisted on being so damn honest. "I..." His chest felt tight, holding the words in.
"You don't have to tell me," Yohji said, squeezing his fingers. Aya twitched. "I guess it doesn't matter, since --"
Reaching out, Aya laid his right hand across Yohji's mouth. The blond's eyebrows rose in surprise, but he didn't protest. "No," Aya said, "The first time, in the rain, I didn't fight him. I wanted it. But later, when I realized he'd... you'd...." Huffing out a sigh, he shook his head. "When you came home still drunk... you looked like you were hurting so damn bad... and I got pissed off. I went to even the score. The warehouse was a trap, I knew it, and I wanted to know why. Because I... I --"
Yohji's tongue darted out and caressed his palm. With an undignified squeak, Aya yanked his hand away.
"Why, Aya," Yohji said, his tone light and teasing. "You do care."
Growling faintly, Aya wrapped his hand around the back of Yohji's neck and pulled him forward until their lips met. It wasn't the kind of hungry, demanding kiss Schuldich had had. And Yohji didn't taste of cigarettes, as he'd half-expected. Releasing his hand, Yohji slid his arm around Aya, his fingers caressing his back. There was something so comfortable, so familiar, in the way their mouths fit together that Aya wondered what had taken him so long to try it.
When they finally broke apart with slightly breathless gasps, it was Aya who said, "Good answer." The echo of Schuldich's words freed him from the other redhead in a way he couldn't explain.
Yohji just smiled and reached up to tangle his fingers in the red silk of Aya's hair.
And outside the window, a soft rain fell, washing away the soy sauce stain of shadows on the world.
~owari~
All fiction © 2002-2005 Tavam Shaytar