It was all Marik could do to stay out of the hurricane of Bakura's rage.
The Egyptian didn't know what had gotten the spirit riled up so – he had simply come home particularly wrathful. Marik had made him a bloody steak – the way his lover liked it best – and Bakura had lost his control of his anger, and released it in a horribly messy way. The plates and cups and glasses that Marik had worked so hard to afford were in pieces on the linoleum floor of the kitchen, and Bakura had retreated to the bedroom they shared.
Marik was kneeled on the floor, his long fingers cut to shreds on all of the sharp pieces that littered the floor. It had been three months since Bakura had been this angry, and he never confided in Marik what exactly it was that he was angry about. Marik sighed softly; his future with Bakura had seemed so bright until today.
Bakura was his hero, his savior. And though the spirit occasionally lost his mind over something Marik had never been able to figure out, he was still Bakura, and he was still his.
About half an hour later, Marik had finished cleaning the floor from all the shattered pieces. Looking at all of them spattering the black bag gave Marik a sense of foreboding; what if he and Bakura weren't meant to be together, and this was a sign from the heavens? Heaving a sigh, he turned the tap to lukewarm and began to clean his fingers and hands of the blood he'd shed cleaning the wake of a storm. A few were alarmingly deep – and some just wouldn't stop bleeding. Marik stared down at his lacerated and bruised hands, a single tear falling just between his fingers. He'd been with Bakura for three years – and they were still arguing in this way. It made Marik wonder if they were meant to be at all.
Marik was sick of all of the empty threats Bakura made to him; and he was sick of the violence in the home that they had made together. He was sick of Bakura threatening to hit him. He was sick of it. But it wasn't like he'd ever leave Bakura.
Marik had tried to touch Bakura this time, trying to get the spirit to calm down. Instead, the Egyptian got screamed at, told not to touch him. And though Bakura had called him ugly – something which had cut deeper than even those cuts on his hands – Marik could never leave the spirit. He was all that he had.
He turned the tap off and slid down the counter, hitting the floor roughly. His tears began to fall more earnestly now, streams and streams of them falling from his wisteria eyes, eyes that were miserable. He wanted to love Bakura, to keep the spirit happy and for the spirit to love him in return.
Marik wiped his eyes with the back of his wrist, wincing when he heard a horribly loud crash from their bedroom. Marik knew better than to go and find out what was going on in there. He knew that when Bakura had calmed down and their bedroom was no longer a danger zone, that it would be completely ruined. Last time, the curtains had been ripped down and the curtain pole snapped in half. Some of his and Bakura's clothes were ripped to shreds. The lamp was shattered into pieces and Bakura's hands would be bloody and lacerated – just like Marik's were now. And Bakura would just come out of the room like nothing had happened, like what had happened was of no importance.
To Marik it was important. He had tried so hard to make Bakura happy. He thought he had succeeded for those blissful three months. But no matter how hard he tried, he simply couldn't make the spirit happy.
A disgusting thought came to Marik – what if his lover was cheating on him? Would it explain the odd behaviour? Bakura had never exhibited this kind of behaviour while in Battle City. If Marik had to guess; he would say that Bakura had been seeing his ex-host, Ryou. The two were so close that it made Marik slightly jealous – he had always expected that he himself was the closest to Bakura, but he also knew that, realistically, it was Ryou who knew Bakura best. And if Bakura was not cheating on him, then Ryou probably knew why he was having such mood swings since they had become lovers.
With an irritated sigh, Marik picked himself up and dusted himself off, refusing to wallow in his own self pity any longer. He grabbed his black body warmer and his home keys, and headed out of the door, leaving Bakura alone in the house. He jogged down the front lawn and rounded the corner, heading towards the lake that he used to visit with Bakura before he started displaying his angry behaviours. It was a peaceful place – one that reminded him of a happier time.
He lay on his back and stared upwards at the sky. The clouds were rolling across it serenely, and Marik tried to make shapes out of them, but he was never very good at it. It was always Bakura who had made the shapes and pointed out why they worked to Marik.
Today was different. Bakura was not with him.
Instead of focusing on the clouds that were sure to make him feel more miserable and dejected than he already did; he listened to the sounds of the lake's running water. The sound had always been relaxing to him, calming – it reminded him of his sister, Ishizu, and he couldn't remember a time he'd been truly unhappy because of her. She was the most kind-hearted woman that he had ever had the fortune to meet – even more fortunate that he was related to her.
He had jumped in the lake with Bakura once – Bakura had pushed him in, and Marik had tugged at Bakura's leg to make the spirit join him in the water. They had kissed in the lake and had made love by the lake side.
Marik made an angry noise to himself and headed back towards his home. The crashing had stopped and Bakura's black trench coat was gone. Marik took the chance to survey the damage of their bedroom – the room that was theirs; that they had both made.
It was horrifying to his eyes. The wardrobe's door had been ripped off it's hinges and was lain out on the deep purple carpet. There were dents where the wall had given way underneath Bakura's powerful punches nearest to his side of the bed. The bedsheets had been ripped apart by a knife of some sort.
Marik's only picture of his mother – one that Rishid had managed to salvage for him – had been ripped in half, then quarters; the frame's glass piercing the photographic paper.
Marik must have stared at the strewn pieces of what he had left of his mother for a long while. He barely blinked and barely moved, until he gathered the pieces in his hands, and lay back onto the bed that he and Bakura would usually share – except Bakura wasn't here.
The Egyptian wasn't angry with his lover – he wasn't upset. He didn't feel anything. He felt nothing except a hollow emptiness. He didn't know how to stay with Bakura any more. This was over his line; past his limits.
He shut his eyes and squeezed out the rest of his tears – Bakura only got angrier if he saw Marik cry.
"Marik." The voice was familiar to Marik's dreaming mind. It was deep, and it was husky.
"Marik, wake up." Marik's eyes opened ever so slowly. He did not want to face the reality that had befallen him. He did not want to face Bakura. He did not want to realize that the only thing he had left of his mother was now ruined beyond repair. He didn't want to feel anything.
He looked into his lover's garnet eyes, that, though harsh, held apology – something that for Bakura, was extremely rare. Marik just stared at the spirit as if he'd never seen him before.
"Marik, don't give me that look." Marik mentally felt around his face and tried to change his expression into something Bakura wanted to see. He simply could not do it.
"Marik, I went to see your brother." Marik carried on staring at Bakura. "Once I found what I had done, I went to rectify it."
Bakura lay two things gently next to Marik's forearm. The spirit kissed Marik's forehead lightly.
"I'll sleep on the sofa tonight. You seem angry." Bakura left the room, looking back at the Egyptian once more before leaving the room fully. Marik opened his palms – some of his lacerations had reopened, staining the torn photograph of his mother. He looked at the wooden photoframes that Bakura had placed next to him. A gasp of surprise shot out of him.
In one, was a perfect replica of the photograph Marik had – Rishid must have copied them somehow. Marik wiped some of the blood off of his fingertips and gently traced his mother's face, as if welcoming an old friend he thought he'd never see again home.
In the second, was a picture that Marik had taken of himself and Bakura. It was a sunny day, in the early months of their relationship by the lake. Marik was smiling like an idiot – of course he was. He was a sixteen year old in the photo, who had just won his first love over. He was young and he was happy.
But it wasn't his face that had caught his eye. Bakura's garnet eyes were narrowed, but not in the harsh way that they usually were. His handsome face was imperceptibly softer, and his mouth was not smirking. It was not a wide smile, like Marik's was, but it was a smile nonetheless, and it was the smile that Marik adored. It was the smile that had made Marik fall for the spirit. It was the smile that Bakura had done when he realized he had his own body and seen Marik for the first time.
Marik put the frames by his bedside, and grabbed a purple blanket, wrapping it around himself, and walked into the living room. The television set was playing some awful child's programme about wizards, and Bakura was staring blankly at it. His lover's customary blue and white shirt was tossed on the chair perpendicular to the couch. Marik took a few hesitant steps closer to Bakura.
"Marik, I thought you were going to sleep." Marik sat down on the couch next to Bakura and nuzzled under the spirit's arm, so that Bakura's arm draped around Marik's shoulders. Bakura tightened his arm slightly. That was one of the many things about Bakura that had surprised Marik – Bakura liked to cuddle. He was a cuddly person.
Marik leaned in to kiss his lover, Bakura's lips soft and pliant against his, as they always were after they had argued. Bakura tasted like mint and tea, and it was a comforting taste to Marik. Bakura played with Marik's platinum locks gently as they kissed, the television forgotten.
"I forgive you, by the way," Marik commented. "But I can't figure out how you got the picture of us. I'm sure you deleted it." He looked up to see Bakura's smirk.
"I kept it. I liked it. You looked lovely." Bakura pressed his lips to Marik's again, and again. He kissed Marik's nose. "You still do." He kissed Marik's forehead. "You're funny." He kissed his left cheek. "You're charming." He kissed his right cheek. "You're pretty good in the bedroom." Marik's cheeks darkened as Bakura kissed his lover. "And you're beautiful."
Marik snuggled into Bakura's muscular arms once more, and let Bakura decide what they were to watch on the television.
"I'll fix our room tomorrow," Bakura promised, and kissed his Egyptian's sandy blond hair while Marik sighed in contented bliss.
Bakura was always his hero.