Aurora
He suddenly became aware of every single inch of his skin. The pillow against the side of his face, the non-existent draft drifting in through the window, the thousand tiny needles shooting up his cold, numb hands. And, of course, his finger.
His ghost of a finger with its phantom of a touch, gliding on top his shoulders, light as a feather but discernible still by his heightened senses. Hibari Kyoya cursed himself mentally.
"I know you're awake, Love."
An eye cracked open, and the ghost's finger was swatted away with his own. "I told you not to call me that, Herbivore." The eye closed again.
He felt a strange tickling sensation as strands of blue-black hair splayed over his shoulders, the other's mouth so close to his ears that he heard the small 'pop' as it opened. Hibari's hand found its way to the man's face and shoved it away with quite some force before he could speak. He then propped himself out of bed and trudged toward the window, sweeping the curtains aside to let in a ray of faint morning light. Somewhere on the other side of the room, Hibird cooed softly.
"Oi, oi." Came the exasperated voice of the mist guardian behind him. "If you're so intent on keeping this, ah, relationship of ours a secret, why do you always insist on bringing this little creature over?" The question came as naturally as any other, but Hibari could tell the other man had waited a long time to ask it.
He turned to face Mukuro, taking a seat on a chair nearby. "First of all, there is no relationship. And second of all," His eyes bore into the other's mismatched ones, and he could read nothing into them, just as always. "Are you stupid? Do you think a bird could spill all of my secrets to the rest of the world?"
"Kufufufu." Mukuro's lips curled upward into a smirk as he lifted himself off the mattress and approached Hibari. "I had a feeling you might say that."
The prefect blinked in surprise when the other walked right past him and toward the window. Grasping the curtains, Mukuro yanked them open, bathing the room in a bloody sunrise. Hibari could see the forests that surrounded Kokuyo Land, the rubble in which this desolation laid, the earthy green vines, creeping through cracks in the rock, and among them, pink flower buds that looked as if they were about to open.
"Do you know what those are, Kyoya?"
He gave the other a deadpan look. "Of course I do. Morning glories."
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Mukuro's smile, forming on his lips along with something Hibari couldn't quite place. It annoyed him to no end. "But do you know what the morning glory means, in the Victorian language of flowers?"
"How the hell would I know something like that?"
A scratchy sound of metal on metal invaded his ears as the other man closed the dark curtains once again. "Love in vain."
The silence that descended upon both of them weighed heavy in the air; each man clamping his lips shut to see whether the other would ask the question. The question that was burning in the back of their minds but none was going to throw away his pride to ask.
The second part was obvious. Whatever it was they had, it certainly was in vain; their world was at war, and the war did not offer such luxuries as love. And after all of the occasional meetings at an old rendezvous and the endless "one night"s and the assurances of "nothing means anything" and the sex, it was hard enough to be civil to one another on a daily basis.
He heard Mukuro gathering his clothes and hastily putting them on. He hadn't realized that he clenched his hands together, waiting for the question that he wanted answered but didn't want answered and certainly did want to ask.
Hibari looked up at the other man as he finished pulling a shirt over his head and sauntered about the room in search of his hair-tie, the long dark strands falling as he did so. The cloud guardian clenched his hands tighter and he knew what was supposed to happen next; the other would leave, no words spoken, no strings attached.
His mouth was itching to speak.
Mukuro had donned his jacket, and was heading for the door. He waited until he heard the turning of the knob before he let his lips loose in a blurt, "Do you love me?"
The mist guardian turned his head slightly, so that Hibari could barely see his pupils. There was a long pause before he spoke. "No."
"Good."
Hibari watched the door click shut, before reaching out and whistling softly. Hibird landed on the palm of his hand. He set the bird down on the chair as he stood up, reaching for his clothes and donning them with a content expression on his face. Pushing the curtains open as far as they could go, he winced slightly at how bright it had gotten. He leaned his head forward and squinted.
And outside the windows, the morning glories bloomed.
