Crux
by Kaiyrah
A/N: Here's a Soujiro/Yuki that I wrote a long time ago. I'm only now just publishing it here. Enjoy.
Disclaimer: Hanadan and characters = not mine. I'm not making any money off this.
It should be no surprise that when he lowers the chawan from taking a sip, she is standing there, partially hidden by the shoji door. She has always had the uncanny ability to appear in front of him whether he liked it or not, and this occurred so often in the past that it is no shock to him now. In fact he welcomes it. In his foolish younger days he would run away from her; now he openly seeks her out. It has always been a peculiar game of cat-and-mouse with them, but they are both older now, and he thinks that he is ready to settle down. She has been so patient with him all of these years and she has done countless things for him. He has been selfish, but he will spend the rest of his days repaying her.
He smiles at her and invites her to sit down. She obliges and he comments on her pale complexion. Has she been ill? She is not herself; she is not smiling and happy as usual, and at this she forces a smile for his benefit.
She says nothing at first and he takes the time to whisk up for her a cup of tea.
This is no easy task, she knows. After all, she imagines that she is the only woman in the world who would ever do this to Nishikado Soujiro. But she has always been a special case. It is because she is different from the rest of the girls that Soujiro chose her, and it is again because she is different that she must now speak her mind.
They have known each other for seven years and have been together for four. All of this time she has never seen him change - even if she always believed that she would be the one to reform him. On the other hand, she has seen the changes within her and she hates herself for becoming this way, increasingly miserable and reduced to a hollow shell of herself. She remembers the girl she was before she fell for the infamous playboy, she remembers the girl who was vivacious and fiery and just as strong-willed as her best friend.
She wants nothing more than to return to that time. When he sets down the chawan in front of her, she picks it up and rotates it in her palm before taking a sip, a practice she hasn't been able to shake since those tea ceremony classes all those years ago, and she sees him watch her carefully from above the rim of the cup.
As always, his tea is strong and bracing, and it does not slide down easily. Her eyes close, and she comments on its bitterness.
He smiles amusedly, and they both recall that fateful night all those years ago, but for different reasons. She looks on that night with regret. He looks upon it with fondness.
When she puts down the chawan he asks her what brings her to his home.
At last, the moment has come.
With trembling fingers, she reaches into her shoulder bag and procures a small white envelope and places it on the tatami mat, sliding it toward him. Curiosity fills him and he takes the envelope and looks at its contents.
And he feels his heart stop.
He says nothing at first, presumably trying to keep his voice steady, and he asks her why.
She tells him the truth. That she has had enough. That she cannot waste her life away constantly questioning his fidelity. That multiple times she has walked in on him and some unknown girl, and all of those times she has walked away thinking that she would change him and it would never happen again. That after all of those times she has been wrong.
That after all this time, she is finally giving up.
And he is speechless. Because as selfish as it is, he has counted on her waiting for him until he is done fooling around. He has counted on her being there even after witnessing all of his philandering, because he thought that her love for him was enough to keep her by his side. Because although he has played with all of those girls in the past, she is the only one he sees in his future. But now she has taken his dreams and crushed them under her foot with one simple gesture.
He forces down the lump in his throat and asks her again if she is sure about this, and she answers in the affirmative. Staying with him will only hurt her in the long run. He wants to apologize and make her see reason, try and make her stay, because it is not fair that the very moment he decides to finally get serious in his relationship with her is the moment she decides to leave. But if he begs her now to stay by his side, she will not believe him.
And so he forces himself to stay still as she stands and bows deeply as a final goodbye, and as he closes his eyes the last trace of her disappears from the room as she whispers, Goodbye Nishikado-san.
When he opens his eyes she is gone and her perfume is rapidly vanishing from the air and he knows that he has lost the most important thing in the world to him. Still he tries to remind himself that this relationship is just like a cup of tea, that the bitterness is good, that the sweetness will start filtering in after that first sip. But he cannot even take his own advice, for he has made too many mistakes now and there is not a silver lining in sight.
It is only now that he realizes she was his unique chawan; he always needed her but she was all-too-often overlooked and he used her so much until one day she could not take it any longer. And he knows that no one else in the world can replace her now.
He empties out the contents of the envelope into his palm and stares down at the object in miserable rage before flinging it out of the open shoji into the koi pond.
His world is gradually falling apart. But he tries to get through it, and he slowly sips his tea with silent tears streaming down his cheekbones.
And a forgotten engagement ring sinks to the bottom of the pond.
fin