"A Moment so Clear"
Disclaimer: I do not own 'Ouran High School Host Club'
"So you won't ?"
She shook her head slowly, as if enforcing what her words could not. The meaning was clear.
"No, I won't."
"And this is all the answer I can expect from you? Nothing else?"
"No, I'm sorry, but you know I can't marry you."
The last few words hung in the air, and she wished with all her might that they would just vanish from suspension, but there they hung, taunting her, making her weary of the scene they were clearly bringing upon the daily lives of old people who fed pigeons in the park every morning. Sure, usually they fed the pigeons, but today on the dew immersed morning, a few elderly folks with bald patches raised an occasional eye or two towards the rare young couple in vibrant colours on the stony cobble path.
Well really, it was only the woman who wore vibrant colours, which, a certain old man recalled, was strange, because of the several times he passed in here, only the young man did, and the girl wearing normal, inside the ordinary, colours—which was a bit strange in a way itself, because don't young girls love shock to appeal these days? However today, the man was looking disgruntled and desperate; two things very negative to upon the shoulders of a man so young an age –twenty perhaps, the old man thought—and how much passion shines in his eyes! Alas, it is the mark of someone so young. Definite, so young, so young. He shook his head towards the cooing pigeons.
"But I must," he persisted. "I need you all too much, and I can't even begin to express my admiration for you."
"Then say no more, just don't do it," she replied curtly.
"But I have to!" he declared loudly. "I can't live a spare moment without the thought of you. I would give up billiards for you anytime, any day."
"But I don't want you do give up anything for me! I just want you to live on without the thought of me like this." How typical, she thought sardonically.
"It is impossible," he wrenched out, "I cannot."
"Then it is impossible for me too," she replied sadly. "I just can't."
It is undeniable; the old man has been watching this young couple for some time now. So young, he thought musingly as he tossed seeds to the twittering little rats, so foolish sometimes, but also so wonderfully young with so much time. The old man comes four times a week to this rickety old bench, but they only once in a while. On several occasions he quietly witnessed them together. And together, they stood seasons ago, until this morning, the sunlight emanating over the dewy branches under the soft canopy.
So young and beautiful she was, so deliriously in love he was. So typical this situation was, even he-- the old bird man, and were it not for the woman, everything would be just like the screens he sees on the sidewalk way to the park.
Her eyes said absolution. And he sought it with pleasure. Now, to say the truth, the man was a bit of a young romance writer in his younger days, and he saw the situation with spark in his eyes also. He threw more seeds onto the ground.
"Look," she said quietly, hesitating, "I am not ready for marriage. I can't say I don't like you affectionately, but sometimes I wonder if that is only because we are such good friends."
"What do you mean?"
"I don't think I am ready to have a family, I mean, have you thought about children?"
"Yes I have," he said solemnly. The intensity with which he looked into her eyes frightened her for a moment.
"And what of my job?"
"I have a job too. But that does not matter now. What matters is that you marry me. I will take no other answer. Even today if you refuse me, I will be back."
"How am I to persuade you to give me up?" she asked half-exasperatedly.
"You can't! Is it because you don't love me?"
"No, it isn't, but…"
"But what? I will take care of you, I will make you happy, I will provide you with everything you need!"
"What if I don't want everything to be taken care of?" she asked quietly. "I need my own strives and aims to go for. You know how it is."
"And that I know, is what you need, so that is what I will do." He replied softly. "Look, no matter what, you can't deter me from this. I've made up my mind that I want you, and you only, as my wife. I will not marry anyone else. So if you refuse me, my lineage ends here with me."
She chuckled. "I wouldn't feel guilty about that at all."
"You might not now, but you will, sixty years from now when I die, and I leave all my fortune to you, my unrequited lover from my youth."
"And if I die before you?" she mused.
"Then I will leave all to your descendants. No more, will your family be denied fine dining."
"And if I die alone with no one else?"
"Then I will have to bury the money under an apple tree and hope that when I reincarnate I will find it and come for you again. Really, did you think I had no plans? I will always come for you." She had wanted the sidetracking to continue.
"I am the happiest I have ever been with you. Really, I am. Please, marry me, and give me the chance to make you happier than I am. I swear to you now, that I will always give you more than you will give me, and I will always be okay with that."
A few young tears crept out from under her lashes. "Why an apple tree? Why bury your money under an apple tree?"
His eyes lighted. "Because I know you love the flowers from the apple trees the best."
She covered her eyes and cried silently. He wrapped his arms around her light lilac dress.
"Marry me," he whispered.
"Yes," she nodded in disbelief, staring into his eyes, "I will."
"Do you know," she asked with a smile, "that I used to think you had such an ego?" Her hands traced the elaborate pattern of the bed post at the corner.
"And why is that?" he mused, raising one eyebrow. "It's my charismatic personality, that's all. You shouldn't hate it just because it's so enthralling."
"Charismatic?" she laughed her soft chatter. The wind whistled behind her against the gray backdrop of colourless skies behind the large window. A few leaves flew across the countryside.
"Yes I am!" He walked over to her quickly, putting down his book, stepping in front of her. The elegant room had curtains of deep burgundy and a lovely sheen upon the wooden mantles.
"I am also very persuasive," he said, voiced huskily.
"You don't say…" she smiled, fingers trailing across his chest. She felt his heartbeat do a double-take, but despite this, he was all confidence.
His hands roamed to stroke her arms. His lips were suddenly very close, closer than ever before, but she felt the hesitation in his hands. He did not want to scare her off. "I can be very persuasive sometimes."
A bright gleam went through her eyes, almost challenging this statement. "Like how?" she whispered tauntingly, dare rushing up to her teeth.
"Like now." The two lips met, frontiers broken. "Do you see?"
"I think I will have to love you just to preserve our friendship."
"You don't have to love me. We will stay friends," but he thought about her line for a moment. "Do you…"
She nodded. "I never thought I would, but the train ride here I thought about a lot of things. This isn't just friends in a friendship anymore, what we are."
He lifted up her right hand and rubbed it with his other hand. The sensual image was so anticipated that her breath became short. The very action was exactly what he would do. So sensual, so sophisticated, but driving out her weariness at the situation altogether. It was so hard sometimes.
"Your wrist is so thin."
"It comes from working hard."
He let out a small sigh. "Yes, working hard. Too hard it seems."
"Don't," she said, half reproaching.
"I won't," he let go of her hand, kissing her, "not now anyways." There was no use; she couldn't be spoiled in any way.
She held on tight to his shirt collar as he flew up the flight of stairs. She hardly heard his hurried steps on the carpet.
"Slow down, I'm going to fall off here!" she said laughing, cheeks rosy, exhilarated
He only grunted this with immediate dismissal and kept running up the carpet. Nothing could stop him from the bedroom at the moment. His instinct forbade him to slow down, and the breath in his ears driving him on. Her scent was overtaking his senses at the moment. Overthrowing the double wooden doors, he ran and placed her on the bed half-caringly.
She felt a hand tugging away at the lengthy zipper which ran all the way down to her thighs. When has he been so positively romantic? She blushed, despite all the times she's felt this, as he ran down her neck passionately with nothing else in the world. The dimmed lamp seemed to warm her from elsewhere.
"What's gotten into you today?" she asked in between.
"What do you mean?" he asked, eyes closed contently.
"Well, you've been more…I guess, to say that you seem to have a sudden passion spurt would be right," she laughed quietly.
"One can't always be so passionate. I could manage it, but I think it would drive you mad."
"What makes you say that?"
"I remember you used to get very exasperated sometimes when I was with you, but can you blame me? I was too happy for my own good."
"There you go again," she said affectionately, thinking she'd be used to this sort of quip from him by now, but still enjoying every word he said.
"But it's true, and it'll always be true."
"Hmmm just you wait. A few months from now you'll lose all attention for me when I get bigger and bigger, and eventually give it all to your son," she teased.
"I would never!"
"But it would be alright with me…" she said thoughtfully, rubbing her stomach, "it'll be alright as long as you treat him right."
He moved abruptly on the mattress and faced her with a look of seriousness upon him. It took her off guard, but in a good way.
"No, it's not alright, because I won't forgive myself if I ever left you like that."
"Hmm you are so good at charming…" she said sleepily, dozing off contently.
"I have to go, got work in an hour," she said quietly, backing away a step.
He looked onwards sadly, and in an equally silent manner, he replied "you always have to go, so many times."
She was not sure if at the moment the truth would be alright to her conscience, to have the guilt upon her shoulders for years to come, so to retreat, as the first of many steps since then, she freed the falsehood inside her all this time and told it with a sincere but serious face.
"If I don't go now, I'll miss the last morning bus there." Of course he would have figure this out later, but let him find out. The message would be better said that way, she supposed, not because it would be more subtle, but because she wouldn't have to be there to face him anymore.
And so, the young handsome woman bowed solemnly with what the old man thought was a goodbye, and walked off in the other direction, under the now bright sunshine across the park to the station nearby. The old man squinted his still-healthy eyes to watch the last of the lilac disappear beyond the crossing of the street. She did not turn her head.
And he, the young youthful, eccentric suitor, perhaps less dejected than melancholy, turned the other way. He saw that the man walked under a nearby tree and picked up a single, solitary green leaf. It was held onto with the right hand as he walked away in his leather shoes. His step didn't resemble the quick-step, whose owner seems to never have time for the majority, so often seen young lads. It was now, a solid, absolute rhythm that—the old man was sure—would take the young man to far places steadily.
Placing the last of his seed bag onto the sidewalk gently for his dear pigeons, the old man got up slowly to prevent pains, and strolled off whistling a merry tune.
On the second equinox that year, which she remembers as about a week and a half from the park? Yes, she assures herself, readjusting her hat, even though the date is of no real importance. It is this day, today, that she thinks, will be a memorable one.
Stepping off the metro, she walked a few blocks until she reached his new residence. Running past the guard at the gate, who smiled as she waved at him briefly before hurrying into the garden, she wasted no breath and urged her legs to take her as swift as possible to the steps of the grand house. Supporting her hat as to prevent it from falling, she ran and ran, step after step across the lawn, then the sandy pathway, unable to stop herself from smiling.
One after the other she ran up, sweating now. The front was as large as the yard of the university she went to, she remarked momentarily. His servant saw her and smiled warmly. "The master is in the back, Ms. Fujioka. Would you like me to take you there?"
"No thank you," she replied hastily, and sped off. She had thought he would be sleepy from the jetlag, and would be in bed instead.
Turning the corners, she ran along the wall of the house, and finally reaching the veranda at the back. There, she saw him sitting in a white lawn chair reading the newspaper, with a cup of steaming coffee in china ware beside him. He turned around.
"Haruhi?" he said, surprised. He put down the papers.
"You're finally back," she said, panting from exhaustion.
He walked up to her and held out his arm to her. "Did you run here? I'm sorry I haven't been to see you, I am pretty tired from the flight right now."
She smiled, to which tickled something within him. "I ran all the way across your front. I really wanted to see you."
He smiled. "So did I. Did you get my letter?" he suddenly asked quietly.
"Yes. Did you mean what you said?"
He nodded solemnly. "I just wished I had done so in person though, but I couldn't leave…"
She sighed. "It's been too long, so let's just start again senpai. We have so much catching up to do. Do you know what happened to me a while ago at the park one morning?"
"I think I can guess, from what the others have told me, and I think I'm a little jealous now," he said, chuckling softly.
"No, senpai, you know I wouldn't…"
"Don't call me senpai anymore, just my name is fine," he said as he bent down a little lower so that their eyes were level. He took her right hand and brought it up to his lips for a momentary touch only.
"Alright," she smiled warmly. "Tell me about your time in the U.S, Kyouya."
The end.