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i want to work on the theme of communication and i´ve put up some messy words. excuse the sketchyness, might expand to full-fleshed fic later. ideas, rather than forms
waiting for the rain
(there are many things that I would like to say to you but I don´t know how)And then there are these days and these nights, with the rain against the window like a constant reminder -there is a world out there and it´s dark and ugly and you are inadequate-, and the bed is just not comfortable enough and Kyou just can´t sleep. He is too tired to close his eyes and too irritated to calm down, too weak to will himself to sleep.
In the end it´s tv, mute and lulling, and fucking flashing but familiar what does the trick; still the rain won´t let him go completely and he wakes (or regains conciousness, more accurately) to a soft "Kyou-kun" and of course it´s Tohru, because Kyou is the unluckiest boy on earth or something equally teen angst-ridden.
His skin stretches painfully over his bones everytime she enters the room, but of course he can´t tell her that, so he takes the blanket he had drapped over his shoulders and shares it with her. Tohru has come to dislike rain so much, he wonders if it´s not because of him. She shakes rhythmically to each drip, drip, drip of the raindrops. I heard you coming downstairs, she whispers but all Kyou can hear is the wind outside, all he can feel is the warmth of her knee against his shin, the pressure of word in the back of his throat, he only hears her quiet breathing and the rising of her chest, and from the corner of his eyes he see her sleepy smile and has no idea what is going on on tv, and it´s all ruined. Ruined. They are all ruined. At least Tohru manages to finally rest her head on Kyou´s shoulder and catch a bit of sleep. Her hand falls from her lap and Kyou waits half an hour, making sure she is not faking it, before he brushes her palm, his thumb tracing the line of life, in the darkness, under the blanket.
When Tohru wakes up the rain has stopped, her neck hurts from sleeping on the floor, there is nobody there with her (just a vague memory of warmth that she can´t quite decide if it´s real or imagined) and the tv is off.
* twenty-three minutes on the deck (saying something stupid like i love you) Nami has calculated (no, really, she has done the math, all written down and hidden from prying eyes) that one can speak seriously with Luffy an average of twenty-three minutes a month. During that window of time (she refers to it as her window of opportunity, though she´ll probably never admit it) Luffy would listen to you and not be stupid or weird and with a bit of luck he´d actually remember something. The best chance one has is when Luffy is alone, in the deck, looking ahead to some point that is not exactly the horizon but somewhere further still, more glorious, more permanent. Sometimes he gets this absent look on his face, and it´s very serious and Nami thinks that if people could see him like this, if only for a moment, they would understand what Nami sees in him all the time. So she has done the math and she has concluded that since it´s the first day of the month she has twenty-three clean minutes to say it and maybe he would listen, and maybe he would even say something (and that the part that scares Nami, because in her math she has never gone further than telling him), and it´s Luffy so there is a possibility that he is every bit as crazy as she is. It´s against her nature to be so optimistic but well, one´s nature tends to change radically on the Going Merry. Luffy is alone on the deck, and he is serious (perfect, Nami thinks every step, as she holds her breath and with each step she breathes out more and more anxiously; by the time she reaches his side Nami is sure the whole ship can hear her heartbeat) and there is high wind, and his dark hair gets into his eyes and of course this is the end of it all for Nami, because he just looks too gorgeous and there is no way she is going to tell him now. So she spends the next twenty-three minutes silenty looking at the horizon, or maybe further, by Luffy´s side, before he decides he is done with being serious and now it´s time to eat. Well, there is always next month, and Nami never thought she could get this optimistic.
* weakness (are you strong enough to be my man?) The tricky part of living in constant danger is that from worrying too much one goes beyond worrying. When you live with the possibility of death death becomes a constant in your journey. You live at the edge of the abysm and sometimes you can sit there, by your companion´s side and watch the wreck. Fai puts his fingertip against the recent scar on Kurogane´s arm. There is a question on Fai´s lips but it dies before it gets out. Kurogane hears it, nonetheless. "He hurts more," and he is looking at Syaoran. Fai sometimes envies the boy, so focused that the rest of the world shuts out, the noise drown because everything it´s so unimportant, everything but Sakura, everything but their mission. And Kurogane is even more of a warrior that he is, and he pretends he sees black and white as is expected from his appearance, even if Fai knows there is grey underneath that skin. "You hurt more," Kurogane´s voice is so soft and low that Fai has trouble realizing it´s directed at him, straight at him and there it is and Kurogane´s fingers are on his neck, and there is this terrible moment in which all his body turns rigid and cold after his mind actually processes the contact. And there is another moment between staying frozen and leaning into the touch. It´s just one breath. The fingertips linger, and Fai is sure Kurogane is checking for his pulse. He is not hurt (not where Kurogane is touching him, anyway) but he needs it. To Kurogane Fai is clean and complicated and he wants to tell him that it´s okay, that he can hurt, that he can be weak when he wants to but somehow he can bring himself to say the actual words, and there is some kind of masochistic satisfaction in it, in having what Fai needs, like a drug, and being unwilling to give it up. It´s battle, and the enemy is himself. He withdraws the fingers and says something like "it´s good that you are alive" in a low and hard voice.
* match day (i´m trying to say what i want to say without having to say i love you) Everything goes smoothly and Hiruma steps aside, taking the towel Mamori is offering. Sena is running so fast that he is sure the kid is going to get a touchdown before Hiruma can say- "Hey, fucking manager, I fucking lov-" The whole stadium goes wild. "Sorry, did you say something?" Mamori has that innocent look on her face that it´s stabbing his heart. Unable to come up with a witty reply or more swearing Hiruma just shakes his head.