FicWad

Author's notes: if you have any comments or suggestions, please review or let me know somehow.
thanks for reading.



Wincing at the shrill noise of the alarm, I blindly slap my hand out at the nightstand, feeling it shake and drop things to the ground as I strike at it. Finally I feel the button depress and the high pitched shrieking of the clock ends. I lean back into the pillow, letting myself go limp again, curling back against Yohji. His breathing is deep, whistling out softly each time he exhales. It never ceases to amaze me that he can sleep through the alarm like this, but then he’s never really bothered to attune himself to one.
A year ago I would have bolted out of bed immediately, chastised myself for every extra minute spent in bed. Just proves to what extent he’s corrupted me.
His skin is warm against mine, radiating a heat that should be unbearable. I curl in closer, throwing my arm over his shoulders. Yohji shifts in his sleep, moving closer towards me. The sun is warm on my face, undoubtedly spilling over the both of us, surrounding us in a pale halo that runs over our skin and sets Yohji’s hair on fire.
It is almost fitting that he is so undeniably beautiful. Depictions of Atlas show that beauty can be bent; stretched and wrenched in upon itself. That it gleams under the weight of what it covers. He glows, even when killing, stunning in the freedom of his movement. His wire snaps out to reflect his beauty.
Until recently I never thought anything could crush him, that he could go on bearing his burden, his cross (as apt a symbol as there could be, marked so into our purpose, onto our sleeves), forever.
Reaching up I feel out the map of Yohji’s body, all that taut gold skin laid out for my blind perusal.
For once, I’m not pretending at serenity.
There is a bright, fragile air about these moments, like the dawn which I’m ignoring. One change, and it all collapses, either interrupted and destroyed utterly or it goes too far and becomes something of a different nature entirely. I skim my hand leisurely down his back, breathing in the silence of the morning, the absolute calm of being awake, of closeness, my unavoidable awe at tangible beauty of his skin against mine.
I don’t want to open my eyes, it may just be the thing that tips the scale and ruins the moment.
Yohji sighs in his sleep, his chest rising under my arm in a long peaceful exhalation.
As rare as it is, moments like this I almost dare to wake him up and admit that he gives me this, this strange, unbelievable glimmer of happiness in the mire of our continual descent. This strange and unfamiliar and disturbingly comforting sense of hope that I’d only accept from him.
I don’t know if he can see all I take from him. It’s almost unbearable, this choking need of another person, this intense protective caring, and the absolute abandon that these things demand and deserve.
What else could I promise him?
The sound of the shower hisses on through the wall. Groaning softly I sit up, rubbing my eyes open. I glance down at Yohji, realizing like a fool there’s a sleepy smile on my face.
It drops, my brow furrowing, at the unfamiliar expanse of tanned skin against the pillow. Unconsciously I run my hand down his freshly exposed neck, pausing momentarily on a dark bruise near his spine.
This is new.
I thread my other hand up through the shortened hair, fingering the soft dense curls that look strange brushed across his forehead, over his ears which are alien structures on this beautiful head.
Did he do this for the mission? The thought feels stale in my mouth, incongruous with the man lying next to me. Yohji always bragged about his hair, spent hours in front of a mirror perfecting his ‘tousled’ look, preening over it at every opportunity. It was always strangely appealing to watch him toy with it.
This is absurd.
I want to shake him awake, demand that he explain this. My hand is reaching for his shoulder to do just that when I stop myself. This is asinine. I can’t wake him up for something as stupid as my own insecurity.
But why would he do it while I was asleep?
Shaking my head I pull myself out of bed. These thoughts are going nowhere.
Almost by rote I yank the covers off of him smirking to myself as he tenses momentarily, adjusting to the slight chill of the room.
That should wake him up soon enough. I stand watching his eyes fight to stay closed for a moment, absently running my hands up through my own hair.
Why would he do that?
Pushing the thought away I rifle through the closet for something to wear and pull out a pair of dark jeans and a black button-up I’m fairly sure belongs to Yohji.
I pull it on anyway, taking in the faint trace of his scent lingering in the smooth cloth.
Glancing at the clock I cringe internally. I’m late. Looking back at Yohji one more time, I quickly pull my hair back into a loose ponytail, straighten my expression into its customary indifference and run out the door, trying to figure out what I’m going to say to explain my lateness.
________________

I am halfway through with the arrangement of lilies and white irises for the church down the street when Yohji strolls into the shop. I watch him from the corner of my eye as he leans on the cash register, intent, as usual, on getting out of doing any real work.
“Miss me last night Kenken?”
I roll my eyes and select another lily. Yohji can never just greet someone, he has to confuse them.
“Yohji--What did you do to your hair?”
Yohji shrugs, gracing Ken with a lazy smile,
“Like it? I thought I may as well clean myself up if I’m going after this German chick. Europeans like their men sophisticated. Not that I really had to change anything.”
He sounds like an idiot. Yohji never means, or pays attention to, half of what comes out of his mouth.
Ken glances over at me, raising his eyebrow. I stare intently down at the flowers I’m arranging.
“If European women really want sophisticated men, why’s Kritiker having you seduce her?”
Yohji throws his hands up in a mock exasperated gesture and sighs loudly, drawling out in a facetious tone,
“I’m just not appreciated.”
Ken snickers softly behind his back, turning back to the register.
Realizing he’s lost his audience, Yohji crosses the shop, walking slowly forward until he’s pressed up against my back. I focus on finding another iris to finish the piece. I hardly notice when he lifts my hair, running it through his fingers
“Going for a new look love? I like it.”
He pressed the hair to his cheek, breathing in the smell of my shampoo. I can almost feel Ken looking in the other direction.
“Hn.”
I prefer not to respond to these inane statements of his. If he isn’t going to say anything of value, than neither will I.
I glance around. Good, there are no customers. I let him play with my hair for a moment while I finish the arrangement, then turn back to look at him, saying in a low, almost inaudible voice,
“Why did you do that to your hair?”
His smile turns sheepish, he lifts one hand behind his head in a carefree gesture
“Aw, Aya. Don’t you want me to look pretty for this Michelle woman?”
My eyes narrow as my expression hardens. There is no reason for this bullshit.
He balks, dropping the smile. Shrugging off the question with a hollow tone,
“Don’t worry about it. It’s just a part of my cover.”
I shouldn’t be surprised he interpreted like that.
I close my eyes, leaning against the worktable. Does he think I can’t tell when he’s trying not to say something? His voice is purposely empty to hide whatever he’s thinking.
“But who over there is going to know the difference Yohji?”
“Well, I just thought that….It would”
He trails off, looking away from me without answering the question. I grip the table, a little confused. Why should I care? All he did was cut his hair. It’s not as if he suddenly decided he was leaving Weiss, or declared himself celibate.
I almost let him drop it, staring up at him from the corner of my eye.
His mouth is drawn into a thin line, his eyes swimming with an acute sadness, an anxious worry that I’ll press deeper. I look more directly into them, unblinking. Trying to figure out what it means for him to have done this.
My voice comes out level, a slow release of words. He probably thinks its cold.
“Yohji. Why did you cut your hair?”
He frowns at me, pulling himself away with a rapid gesture.
“Fuck Aya, it’s just my hair. Why does it matter why I cut it?”
I don’t answer because I don’t know what to say. I don’t know why I’m so certain this is for more than just the mission. Maybe because Yohji’s always been so vain about it.
Suddenly he smirks, a wry, bitter smile twisting his features. His voice comes out faintly exasperated. Listening, you can tell he tried to fake amusement into it.
“You just can’t handle any sort of change at all, can you?”
I glare up at him, not answering. My fingers dig into the table as I quell the impulse to hit him.
“Glare at me. See what that will solve Aya.” His eyes go cold. I wonder for a moment how long he’s been avoiding saying this.
“You’re a fucking textbook, you know. What’s it like to be guilty Aya? Enlighten us. You sure as hell don’t seem to think about anything else.”
“That’s not true.”
My voice comes out rough, choked with something I can’t identify.
His smirk widens, his eyes become more empty.
“Isn’t it? Tell me, what’s one change you’ve made for yourself. One thing that wasn’t forced on you.”
You, I want to say. He doesn’t give me time to respond, charging forward with this unexpected accusation.
“And what about your sister Aya?”
Almost subconsciously I register my fists clenching.
“Why didn’t you go see her after she woke up? What is it, now that she can actually talk back, you can’t handle it? Just like the sound of your own voice?”
I can’t bear another reflection of myself, something else that screams my own taint back at me. I refuse to mar someone so pure any further by my contact.
My head drops, my bangs blocking any view of him.
I bet he thinks I look resigned, that my posture admits something.
“It’s fucking pathetic Aya. Are you afraid that if you relieve any of your guilt you won’t be anything anymore? Does it define you that goddamned much that you can’t let any of it go?”
There’s a faintly hysterical tinge to his voice, a desperate questioning. I don’t know what he wants me to say.
I refuse to look at him, marveling slightly at the pain of my nails digging into my palms, gouging out small sickles of skin, crescents of blood smearing on the balls of my fingers. My teeth clench together, head inclined over a hospital bed, machines beeping all around, measuring the breath, the pulse, all the vital facts of the girl lying in it, her hair swept around her face, still marked with a faint shock.
“Well?”
My nails dig tighter. The same bed empty. The same girl stretched out, limp over an altar, carried out between the shoulders of two other women, huddled in the back of a car, I can imagine her awaking terrified. I can’t forgive this life for my absence then.
I miss every potential moment of redemption and only then did I finally realize that I am not meant for it. That that sort of respite is impossible.
I glance up, Yohji is getting impatient, more frustrated with every moment of silence. The bell on the door rings, signaling the arrival of a pair of women in housedresses.
“Come on”
I whisper for no reason, leading Yohji back into the storeroom.
Once inside, I close the door, aware of Yohji leering behind me.
My voice slides out in a hiss, almost involuntarily, my expression hardens. I stare at the thick knotted wood of the door.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Really? Then what am I talking about?”
“You know I can’t see her.”
I study the door profoundly, learning the exact maze of its lines, cracks. There’s a small split in the wood by the handle.
I don’t know why Yohji brought this up at all. I bite my lip, turning slowly around to face him.
“She’s better off without me. She’s better off not knowing what I’ve become.”
Yohji leans his arm against the door, looming over me.
“You’re such a fucking martyr aren’t you?”
I hardly register my hands curling into fists, my legs shaking. I’m not entirely sure its with rage.
“Fucking typical.”
He turns around and pulls out a cigarette.
“Shi-ne”
The curse slips out without my noticing. It burns the air between us.
Yohji shrugs.
“Sure, Aya.”
My body goes tense, my head whirls with fragments of missions, my hand soaked in blood, face hot and sticky with it, hair glued to my neck, filmed with a darker red than its own violent color. The sight of her limp form retreating through the crashing rubble of the Elders’ museum.
My voice rasps out, heavy with the images
“Like you aren’t haunted with anything, Yohji.”
He stiffens, holding the stick close to his mouth, paused in the middle of inhaling. Smoke rises up in a thin veil around his face.
I feel the rage rise up in my chest, vindictive and useless. Impossible to ignore. I throw my words out at him.
“What changes can’t you accept Yohji? Tell me now, enlighten me, how does it feel to throw a living body away for a dead one? How does it feel to be searching constantly for her face in the morning after leaving dreams filled with her dying words.”
I pause, stunned by the pain that shoots through me suddenly. If I didn’t know better I could have sworn it was edged with jealously. Disgusting, I’m jealous of a dead woman now. I’m such a fool. Aya-chan’s smile flashes across my vision, her eager laugh trills in my ear like smooth rippling water. Her smile paints her light eyes with that laughter. With Yohji’s laughter. Green eyes flash back at me, dark and teeming with rage, pain etched around them in thin lines.
I’ve been told pain, anger makes me look younger.
Yohji like this, without his smile, with his face contorted so, looks old. Exhausted.
Hope, I think, is what makes Yohji beautiful. Even his pain always had a lightness to it. This doesn’t though, not now or anymore. I’m not sure yet.
Fascinated somehow by the strangeness of his face, the unfamiliarity of his expression I push further, reckless, letting reason fall aside completely.
My voice goes lower, spilling out in a pointless vindictive mutter.
“Tell me this Yohji? How do I look in her place?”
He flicks away his cigarette. My only warning.
With an exasperated cry he throws me back into the wall, my frame crashing into it with a resounding thud, the forcing knocking down some pots on a nearby shelf.
He holds his arms on either side of me, staring into my eyes with those swirling masses of brilliant color, wet with pain and a strange panic. They have a desperate cast to them, overwhelming the rage made clear in the set of his mouth.
Glaring back, I knock his arm aside, ducking towards the door to leave. Fuck him.
I focus on the look in his eyes to avoid thinking.
His hand flashes out and locks the door, then snaps back to grab my arm, pinning me down on both sides. His voices hisses out, low and painful to hear.
“Stay there! Stay right the fuck there!”
He slams me back against the wall again to punctuate. My ears are ringing from the crashing pots. Colors swim over my eyes and merge with the shadows covering his face, leaving only his eyes bare, obvious.
“For once, you’re going to listen.”
I can feel the glare drop. What does he mean, ‘for once’?
Confused, I let myself go limp in his grasp. Inclining my head forward to hear him.
“I am so tired of everything. So goddamned sick to my stomach of nothing ever changing, nothing ever getting the slightest bit easier.”
His voice is dangerously calm, hissed out low between his teeth. There’s nothing I can do but listen. I tilt my head back, catching the strange desperate look in his eyes.
He leans forward, inching towards my face, that solemn intent look in his eyes. He stares into my eyes, locking our gazes. I’m almost afraid to think of what he must see in mine.
Then he looks away slowly, shaking his head, a sick disgusted laugh spilling out of him.
“You’re just so fucking untouchable, aren’t you Aya?”
I cringe, fighting the urge to bite down on my lip.
“You almost had me fooled with that. I never know what the fuck you’re thinking, unless you deign to inform me, handing it down like its some earth shattering revelation, some goddamn gift from the gods.”
He checks my eyes again, staring into them deeply, as if they’ll tell them what to say next. Wouldn’t surprise my if they did.
“Are you so great Aya? You’re so wrapped up in your own shit, your own unresolved guilt………so you’re cursed Aya? Maybe if you looked outside of any of that you might be able to stop some of it, let it go, don’t you think?”
The words spill out faster, more desperately, in a rough incoherent rush. From the raw look in his eyes, it seems like he’s asking something else I can’t make out, I can’t understand through his ranting.
“What do you think I am Yohji?”
Why does honesty seem like it has to be involuntary, the words said before you’re able to consider them.
He actually stops at this, his eyes going wide, I can watch them tear over what to say. His fingers dig into my arms.
“Nothing.” he pauses, seemingly getting a better grip on his thoughts. His voice rises with them.
“I think it’s a fucking shock that you choose to be around anyone. Are your ghosts not enough company? I think you’re waiting for something, anything, to come and lift you from this, and that you don’t believe in that. I think you like to think that you’re cursed”
I feel my glare start up again, reshaping my features into a tight mask. No.
Why did I ask him anything?
He charges on, the words coming out in a confused rush, baring everything.
“…and we’re just to fill in the interim, before whatever frees you from this finally arrives. Is that why you always go ahead in missions? You act like you have a fucking death wish, throwing yourself into the front like it’s a damned compulsion. How the fuck is that supposed to make me feel?”
That last shocks me. His voice continues on in a rapid fire of inchoate speech, buzzing over my ears.
I interrupt, throwing it out there in a small voice.
“It’s not about you.”
His face twists in anger, then stills abruptly. A light, easy mask. His eyes pierce through them with brutal feeling.
“You’re right. It never is about me Aya. God forbid I get in the way of your guilt, your reckless, cold hearted, distant shit, that I interrupt one minute of your self-loathing. You think no one sees it? You think you hide from the world so well? Do you?”
I am paralyzed.
He shakes his head, frustrated, his voice shaking with some feeling I can’t identify.
“You’re not going to answer me.”
His voice is low again, going quiet with that observation.
“Sometimes I think you just don’t know what else to do. You’re so lethal, so dangerous, so hard to touch; are you incapable of changing yourself?”
It’s not myself that would have to change, but what I’ve done.
He presses on, his voice taking up a hysterical tone
“Do you ever forget Aya? Is this what you wanted to be, this cold, empty monument to guilt and suffering? Don’t you ever stop it?”
No. My eyes close. Red wells up on the inside of my eyelids, playing back smears of blood down my arms, the warm resistance of bodies torn on the blade. The short bitter screams, hollow and all too accurate accusations.
And walking away. Always walking away. There’s no finality to this sort of death.
“Do you ever get tired of being hurt?”
What does he want from these questions? I don’t know what else he can get from me.
“What lies do you tell yourself Aya?”
I don’t tell myself anything, it’s not worth it to believe in anything.
I glance down at the door, staring away from him.
His voice becomes mocking again, an angry lilt to everything he says.
“What’s the matter Aya? Want to leave? I was right, you never fucking change.”
My own image curves out of the door at me, younger, brighter, a shy smile on my face. I blink and the image ages, the face controlled into a cold mask that barely hides my anger, the hair ragged and un kempt as it grows, a pool of flood marking my drowning in it. The face smoothes out, becoming calmer, the rage locked into violet eyes and covered with an inexhaustible bitterness, a solemn resignation reflected in the silver of a blade whipping through the air. it’s the only mirror that really suits me.
And to think, once I thought I was capable of the profound.
Glancing back up, Yohji seems to be searching for words.
“And so we’re left to wallow in our own private agonies. You’re selfish Aya.”
My voice spills out unexpectedly, a quiet denial
“No.”
“Then how come you never listen, you never look out of what you’re becoming. I don’t know where you’re going. I’m tired of watching you fall.”
I shake my head, violently, knocking my head back as I do. He should know by now, no one should depend on me for anything.
“This is what I never get about you, are you really so trapped in your own self-hating world that you can’t see or understand what anyone else is feeling or doing, is your own private hell that consuming? That important, Aya?”
He closes his eyes, apparently tired of looked at me.
“Or are you just so goddamn callous you can’t be bothered to care?”
No. My mind surges forward, snapping back into the moment, returning whatever limited powers of speech I possess. It writhes with vitriol, snapping the last hold on reason, on silence, I’d been holding on to.
“Go to hell, Yohji.”
My voice come out shockingly numb. He drops his grip on my arms, his eyes shooting down to stare at the floor. I want to reach out and touch his cheek, he looks so lost. I have no idea why.
“And join you?”
He smirks back at me, a wild, dangerous look on his face. A horrible insulting twist of his features. His eyes laugh at me, burning through their momentary lapse of sorrow, shaking off the posture of agony he’d adopted for a moment.
It’s as if I’m viewing it outside my body, me tensed and rigid against the wall, shaking with fury, my mouth twisted into a thin line, a cruelly icy stare painting my eyes dark. And Yohji standing away from me, forcing his movements to be lighter, visibly willing them to not betray whatever it is he’s thinking. My body loosens, pushing off the wall in a lithe fluid move, my arm snapping forward as my eyes narrow, vision swimming red and strange, my breath a heavy trancelike presence in my ears. A flash of black cloth and a resounding crack of my palm on his cheek. His head thrown back in a blur of skin, his mouth open in vague astonishment, teeth flashing white in the thin light shooting in between the blinds.
I’m such a fool, I don’t even hit him properly.
He stares at me, the smile dropping into a cold, lost confusion. His hands are limp at his side as his face flushes, a red imprint of my hand left to mark the moment.
I stand for a moment, stunned, paralyzed again, waiting for him to respond somehow, to hit me back or yell or just, do something other than stand there looking so confused.
He doesn’t move.
I spin around and yank the door open, almost knocking into Ken who was standing nearby.
“Aya, is everything alright?”
His voices rushes past me, I spare him a glare, glancing back towards the storeroom. Yohji leans against one of the tables, on hand threading through his hair, staring at the floor.
I keep walking.
I am such a fool, but I’m not fool enough to stop when Sena touches my shoulder, asking in his light childish voice if I’m okay.
I keep my eyes straight ahead towards my destination, staring past the customer, the flowers, ignoring the crowd of schoolgirls that rush over to me, pushing through them. Pushing the door open I step out into the bright warm day. The sun is glaring, forcing me to squint as I step quickly over to my car and wrench the door open, throwing myself into the driver’s seat and turning the key in the ignition, as soon as the engine turns I’m gone, pulling away with a loud scream of the tires, driving frantically, going absolutely nowhere.
__________________

I pull over as thoughts start to overwhelm me, the lingering numbness of the fight receding as I turn the engine off.
I have absolutely no idea where I am, but that doesn’t matter. A field stretches up around me, reflecting on the window in iridescent oranges, reds, glass tinted with pink as the sun sets, throwing a faint glare on my windshield, faintly obscuring the view.
“I’m so tired of everything.”
Yohji’s voice rings through me, I grip the steering wheel, leaning my head back. I’m tired too. He’s right. Nothing ever changes.
Is it because we don’t let it change; what are we afraid of?
I would have thought by now I had nothing left to lose, nothing to risk by not holding on to my humanity.
It’d be so much easier if I let myself forget about everything, stopped the images, the words that serve as a background to every halting step forward, a rhythm that determines the way I fall.
“I think you like to think you’re cursed.”
Yohji sneers at me in my mind. He doesn’t understand. I am cursed. There is no possible respite from this descent, this continual stream of loss.
I didn’t have to choose this. That’s why my crimes weigh so heavy, why I force my guilt into a mantra to remind me.
“You think you hide from the world so well?”
No, I can feel my control slip every time I draw my sword up, feel it shatter every time Yohji makes me feel something that’s somehow untainted with the guilt I’ve turned into my life.
He’s a break in that perspective, that panorama of continuing death, continuing to plunge. He thinks I’m so restrained, he has no idea how I’m spiraling out of control.
“Do you ever get tired of being hurt? What lies do you tell yourself Aya?”
I wince, beating my head down into the steering wheel. A few weeks ago I asked Rex to tell Aya-chan that I’m dead.
“You’re selfish Aya.”
His voice echoes through the car, a cruel sort of laughter behind it, a choking the sound of the flat words.
Rex refused to. Aya-chan probably wouldn’t have believed her anyways. She always held out hope for what she wanted, no matter how unlikely it was, she’d cling to it, stubbornly. Unreasonably denying everything to the contrary.
A trait we seem to share.
What does Yohji want me to do, overcome this? Cast out my demons, shrug off my numerous sins? Find a way to wash my hands of this blood?
Forgiveness smacks too much of piety, of surrender.
If I can carry my guilt, I can withstand it.
I worry nothing would come of such surrender, such a shattering of the basis of all my actions now. I’d drown in it, without even pride left to hold me afloat.
“I’m tired of watching you fall.”
Why does he think I left after Weiss dissolved the first time?
Why does he think I never said goodbye.
I’m sick of him consuming himself with everything. He’s slipping too, and damned if I’m going to break his fall.
“Or are you just so goddamn callous you can’t be bothered to care?”
Callous……don’t I wish.
I’m tired of reliving everything. I used to be fool enough to believe it would pass, that if I shoved the blade in fast enough it’d be over. Done with.
Immediately it ends, passes.
And returns the next day when I wake up. An hour later when I’m cleaning the blade that is only a conduit and proof of my actions.
Whatever chance I had to get out I abandoned, staying on to protect everyone.
Who the hell did I think I was, so convinced I could save anyone?
At least I no longer am blind enough to think I can save myself.
Every time I kill a part of my heart dies, a part of the boy who watched his sister run over, who returned to dig through the burnt remains of his home, searching for bones to bury, something to inter and light incense over. Anything at all. And got sick on the rotten smell of the decaying wood, swollen with rain from the night before, spent in silent witness by a hospital bed, the first of such reverences.
I used to think Aya’s forgiveness would cleanse me of this, leave me pure again, return to me a name that isn’t so ruined with blood.
I refuse to see her because I’m afraid it won’t change anything. I know she’ll forgive me for anything I did in her absence. Her beloved oniichan, she’d never accept how much I’ve really changed.
I bite my lip against the thought, the worry for her. I don’t even know where Kritiker sent her to school.
“I was right, you never fucking change.”
Yohji’s smirking face superimposes over Aya-chan’s.
I’d say it was too much if what I’m avoiding wasn’t even more to be asked of me.
For once, I’m not going to give in to sacrifice, let another thing slide away from me.
Yohji’s bright smile as he parades his whore through the shop, whichever one it was that week, all simpering and pressed against him, baring their cleavage. His cold smirking eyes as he caught my glare, my stiff pained staring at them.
And then I’d give in when he returned to me that night, saying everything he was supposed to.
Then he’d act surprised when he woke up to find me gone.
I remember the first time he asked me to stay, waking up and grabbing my wrist as I lifted myself off the bed.
“Don’t go.”
His eyes were desperate, filmed with raw tears caught up in the corner of his eye.
“Please. Let’s stay here together.”
Stunned silent I crawled back into bed and let him hold me, promising everything he could think of.
And it was only few days later that I killed Reiji Takatori and left, without saying anything, to realize how little my revenge had gotten me. I remember how heavy I felt, how it seemed the bottom dropped out from my stomach, the ground from under my feet as I stood outside Villa Weiss, my clothes encrusted with blood. How I waited outside through the night until even I realized that nothing had changed with that action. So I changed it myself, again, with a different one.
He didn’t follow me.
When we were forced back together, when Weiss came back together to fight Esset, he accused me of the same things.
They just didn’t hit so hard then.
I let him watch me, a cold horrible apprehension in his eyes. A clear, obvious ‘why?’ that he didn’t bother to hide from me as he chased after the dream of his past.
I lied to him, keeping my distance carefully, blocking out any hope for him with the thought of my sister.
I seem to use everyone.
He came to me the night he killed Neu, throwing himself at my feet in a pitiful wreck. His eyes were hollow and tinged red, his voice was empty as he apologized, wracked with whatever guilt he could imagine for himself.
I let him grab at my knees, lying his head in my lap as he mourned Neu, mourned Asuka again and again until the names merged together in one confused mournful wreck, and took me the next day to light incense at her grave, being careful to stop with me at the marker which immortalized the death of Ran Fujimiya and his parents. Three empty urns wrapped in withering flowers. We changed them and left, without saying anything at all.
I let him think I could piece him back together, never certain whose eyes he was trying to see when he looked at me, whose lips he felt as he pressed me close.
I thought it was perfect. I didn’t deserve anything better. Me, who killed, who betrayed the best of both of our intentions for grief.
And then he pulled me out of the water, hauling my shaking, cold body out of the freezing sea, and we watched together as the Elder’s museum collapsed in on each other. Not saying a word.
The next day, after being told Aya-chan was alive, after being released from the hospital, I moved everything into his room and tried to promise him with my eyes that I’d never leave.
I was sure that he understood, looking entirely at me, without any corrupting images, pulling me into his arm with a wide grin, a brilliant green depth to his eyes, a light I could lose myself in, watching it sparkle.
It’s something people would ascribe to him as being constant, saying that he always has that look about him.
It only appears rarely. I’m convinced that it’s the only thing he can’t force.
I couldn’t prevent it, I let myself feel it too, smiling as he moved me carefully over to the bed, laying me out solemnly, a look of joy setting his face on fire, his features glowing as he whispered to me.
“I love you.”
It was the first time he said it. I wasn’t sure how to recognize the feeling in myself, so I stayed silent.
“You’re so beautiful”
I believed him in those moments because of the look in his eyes.
I wonder how he thinks I can be beautiful when he sees all my weaknesses spread out before him, so glaringly repulsive that he can’t help but throw them back at me.
He’s right, I never do change.
I sit there, bent over the steering wheel, my hands buried in my hair. I taste the metallic twang of blood when my teeth slip, cutting into my lip.
Slowly, I realize my shoulders are shaking, my breath coming out in deep shuddering releases. I taste the faint salty flavor of tears as they run down my face, mingling with the blood on my mouth.
Fuck.
I thought I wasn’t going to do this ever again, now that Aya’s awake.
I yell as I slam my hand into the dashboard, letting it splay out there, the fingers stretched out on the smooth wood.
Yohji’s leaving in a week.
That should be enough time to figure out what’s really upsetting him? Or at least where all this is coming from.
Shouldn’t it?
I’ve got to shake these memories off.
Feeling an oddly comforting glimmer of hope, I pull myself up from the dashboard and start the car, throwing it into drive and heading back towards the Koneko, speeding as fast as I know how to.
I can show him this much change. I want this, I don’t want to let this go.
I….I don’t know how to admit it, but I love him. It strikes me hard, forcing me to speed, my knuckles going white on the stick.
I don’t know if he knows that. Maybe he can see it in my eyes, see it well up large and undeniable and threatening because I know that someday, I’ll just end up having to let him go too.
Maybe I won’t have to. Maybe even if I don’t deserve it, I can have him.
Maybe this will make my grief for myself lighter.
It’s strange to realize that I don’t care if this kills me.
I’m already cursed, what more harm could this do?
________________________

Sena jumps up from the kitchen table as I burst into the apartment, trying to stop me from going further.
“Aya- are you alright? You looked upset back there in the shop.”
I push past him, letting his words fall on deaf ears. I don’t have time for his worried act. Omi did a good job picking him, he’s just like Tsukiyono was. Always sympathetic, always concerned.
I’m not in the mood.
As I walk out of the kitchen he shoots something else at me, I shrug it off, barely hearing it in the background of my own mantra, the same resounding thought that’s been pushing through my skull since I pulled in.
‘Go find Yohji.’
Kyo is stretched out on the couch, he, like Sena, tries to say something to me that I don’t register.
’Find Yohji’
I bolt up the stairs, taking them two at a time, three at a time, pulling myself forward, upwards. I run down the hall, throwing the door to our room open.
He’s not here.
Slowly, I walk over to sit on the bed and wait, curling up by his pillow. I feel a little stupid, overly sentimental, but that fades as I inhale the lingering smell of his skin trapped in the pillow.
Leaning back, I hear a soft crumple, a crackling of paper under my back.
I sit up, looking around for the offending thing.
It’s probably something I forgot to put back in my packet. If it was, I probably can‘t afford to lose it. I search around, spreading my hands over the dark blanket until I find it, a small folded piece of lined paper lying on my pillow, slightly rumpled from my lying on it.
Most definitely not from my mission packet.
My hands shaking, I fold it open. There’s something ominous in the movement.
Yohji’s indiscriminate scrawl spreads over it in black ink. Several things are scratched out and written in again. The whole page is a mess.
Confused, I reach over to find my glasses, searching the nightstand for them.
Bending over the edge of the bed, I find them on the floor. I must have knocked them over this morning.
Hn.
Slipping them over my ears, I start reading.
“Aya,
I can’t explain this afternoon and I won’t try to.
I need something to change. You have no idea how tired I am of the same old shit rearing it’s head.
Maybe I shouldn’t have said what I did, but it was too much. All those thoughts and accusations overwhelmed me and I just couldn’t help but say them.
It hurt so much, it made me see red when you mentioned…”
Something was scrawled out, a series of names,
“…her.
I think about it too much.
I’m sorry if I hurt you, or insulted you, but right now I can’t deal with seeing you. I need time to think things over. I need to get these voices out of my head.”
I can feel my fingers clench around the paper, threatening to rip it apart.
“Ken thought we might need some extra time to do reconnaissance, so we traded our tickets in for ones that leave tomorrow morning. We’re staying in a hotel by the airport, so we can leave as quickly as possible. Sena, Kyo, and Persia have already been notified of our departure…..”
So that’s what they tried to tell me. Stupid. I never listen.
Another thing that never changes.
“…When I watched you storm out it brought up too many bad images, too many painful thoughts.
I am tired of you leaving.
Maybe someday you’ll want to fix things and stay, but right now maybe it’s better. It’ll give us both a chance to think things over.
I’ll call you in a few days, once we’ve settled in.”
The diacritical marks seem hesitant, as if he’s trying to decide whether or not to put something down, scratching light confused lines over the paper.
“I love you. Don’t think that this changed that.
.Yohji.”
I can hear rather than feel my hands crumpling the paper. My eyes blur, leaving me in an exhausted daze.
My breath comes out in shallow quick spurts as I lie down, clutching the damned note to my chest.
The door opens.
I hardly notice when Sena pokes his head in.
“Aya, are you sure you’re alright? I mean I’m not sure if you heard me downstai-”
My vision still distorted, I interrupt him
“I’m fine, Sena.”
My voice is cold, unwavering. Maybe this is what Yohji meant about being untouchable.
He inclines his head and shuts the door quickly, leaving. I wonder if he is relieved to be away from me, either of them .
“Maybe someday you’ll want to fix things.”
A tear tracks unwanted and unexpected down my cheek.
I almost laugh at the irony, I finally want to stay and make this work and he leaves.
I should have expected it.
“I love you. Don’t think that this changed that.”
I pull the note up to my face, reading that one line over and over in the dim light. An incredible exhaustion runs over me as I consider searching all the airport hotels for him.
Trying to raise myself up, I fall back into the pillow, my elbow slipping on the sheets.
Still grasping the note in my hand I roll over, back onto Yohji’s side of the bed and fall asleep, running his voice through my mind and waking the next morning with the note lodged under my back, and Yohji’s black shirt wrinkled around me.
In the morning, it was impossible to deny that he had left, or the small hope I reserved for his return.
Only a few days, then I could talk to him. I settle back into the bed, to sleep through the morning. Someone could cover for me in the shop. I don’t care.