Fandom: Viewfinder
Title: a place where I shouldn't be.
Rating: pg-13
Pairing: Yanzhui + Fei Long
Description - Fei had two brothers that lived in the same body... (Note: Yanzhui and Fei Long pairing)
Disclaimer - Finder no Hyouteki / Viewfinder wa Yui no koto ga janai. Demo, Viewfinder wa suki dakara, fanfic wo kakimashita. (Yes, the poem is mine.)
We held hands
as a piano played,
but a vase shattered in between
our little space of heaven.
In my mind, there were shouts
for that of blasphemy.
I smelled my own blood
while tasting yours on my red lips.
I take from you
what is most important to you
as you watch me with subdued eyes
and hands holding onto me with all your might.
Do you remember me? Haven't I always been beside you?
Will you? Please carry me as far as you can walk.
Do you remember how it felt to fall to the Earth? I prayed and prayed you wouldn't remember the day-
I tore your feathered wings
so that you could never leave me,
but I forgot that you were not the kind
to give up so easily.
You had two feet
to walk away.
So, move on
before I keep you from
getting to where
you really need to be.
A place where I shouldn't be.
But tell me why are your eyes still staring back at me?
There are tears when I thought there shouldn't be mercy
for someone like me.
Why are you crying for me, my beautiful one?
a place where I shouldn't be.
by miyamoto yui
Creak.
/As his eyes briefly regarded the world beyond the bright window, my lips grimaced. I immediately got up from my desk, holding onto the wooden desk.
Seething in an inner entropy, his eyes met my narrowing ones. I mentioned his injury as he looked away trying to brush it off as if it wasn't anything.
Whether or not it was serious wasn't the problem, Fei.
It was the fact that you had been blemished by something other than myself. Unreasonable, yet true in my eyes.
I held the desk for support. "You messed up, didn't you?"
And then, I let my hands go and my mouth went off at its own. Unable to look at you, I said all those spiteful words to you.
Hitting you at a place where it was sure to make a mortal wound:
That ever pure heart.
Hateful, wasn't I?
I walked away as if it didn't affect me at all.
But when I closed that door, I stared at it for a second longer than I should have. There was always something in the way, wasn't there?
My callous words, my scathing expressions...
...all to keep from breaking down all the defenses of you getting deeper into me.../
I came into your room as you took a small nap on your bed. I sat on your bed and watched you sleep deeply, untouched by anything at all.
This was how we used to be when we were little, right? I would always come to your room to apologize. I would find some way to bribe my way with a gift that would say the words "I'm sorry" because they wouldn't come from my lips as they were supposed to.
But now, as we became older, there weren't words to convey my sorrow, were there?
Instead, only more hurtful words to completely tear you away from me.
There was only silence and pain to fill in the gap that seemed to widen,
pretending that Father was in the way.
Now, I did what I shouldn't have.
I touched the top of your head and ran my fingers through your hair. Right to the ends. I felt the soft tips in between my thumb and index finger.
My face didn't know what it meant to cry.
Not in the lives we led.
I patted your hand softly. You wouldn't let me help you, wasn't that right?
So grown up, aren't we?
I didn't mean to send you there, but you were the one I trusted the most.
But was it worth to send you out knowing that you could have left at any time once you understood the breakable, burnable ropes that bound you to me?
/"Again and again, I keep on warning you. Don't ruin your own brother and yourself."
"I'm doing nothing of the sort, Father. Just because I send him on dangerous mission-"
He gave me a stern look that tried to condemn me with the words he couldn't even say./
At the mere thought, I suddenly took my hand away from the shiny, healthy hair I used to tease you about. I took one last glance at you and left the room.
Before I did, you turned over and mumbled in your sleep, "Nii-sama, why do you hate me so much now?"
With my chin up, I glanced away and walked out of the room with all the pride and confidence that could I conjure up at that moment.
There wasn't much of it left, though.
*/*/*/*
Father turned over in his bed. His back was towards my direction after he sent all the attendants away from his room. His hand rested on the mattress once more as the tension increased within the air.
It was only a matter of time.
Something I didn't have much of...
"You have made all the necessary arrangements, haven't you?"
I nodded my head. "Yes, I have, Father."
There was an overbearing quietness between us.
"When I am gone, you'll only have Fei Long. You do understand this."
Calmly, I folded my hands on top of one another in front of me. "You've been telling me this all my life."
"But you refuse to truly listen to me."
"About what? I've been following everything you've ever told me. And I even did some innovations within our organization. Aren't you pleased with them, Father?"
My hands gripped onto one another a little more.
I knew exactly what he was trying to get at...
"I am very proud over what you've done."
Then, his tone went down one octave.
My heartbeat increased under the pressure.
It was the usual strain that became tighter with each formal recognition and denied realization.
"However, you can't keep him the way you want him to be."
'It's shameful', you were trying to tell me.
"The more you try to force him to be something that you want him to be, he'll beg for his freedom."
You're telling me he'll leave me?
Sure, I know of that possibility, but as long as I have jurisdiction over this, it wasn't going to happen anytime soon.
I was trying to make sure he'd never have to though...
"I don't see anyone trying to restrain him. He does as he pleases, I just tell him his missions-"
"Dammit, Yanzhui." Father sighed as I stepped forward.
I put my hand on his shoulder as he held onto mine.
"You will both lose each other if you continue on as you both do. Stop acting in front of him, Yanzhui."
I took my hand away. "You always spoil him and you always scold me even though I'm the one who's had to take responsibility for everything."
"You are the only two I have."
I bowed with his back to me. "Excuse me, Father."
I walked away from him and headed to my office.
I know that very well.
Stop pointing out what I already know...
The world's been telling me for years.
But I wouldn't listen. When did we ever play by the rules that society set out?
We had our own code in this life.
And so, this was my abominable sin held inside of me,
an addiction worse than any vice imaginable in the world.
*/*/*/*
SLAP~!
You failed me...?
YOU FAILED ME?!
Shamefully, my calmness waned and my anger boiled, pulsating as I held onto his hair, coiling it around my hand.
I shouted that you had chosen that person over me.
That's what I was upset about.
Not about the organization at all. Or even about the hand that wasn't healed by me.
You were starting to pull away from me, weren't you?
Why did it come so fast?
I wasn't going to just stand by and watch you do it voluntarily!
You winced as I pulled on your hair some more. I insulted the very hair that had partly made you
so beautiful to me. Then, I pressed my hand in between your legs.
He took this too, didn't he?!
Afterwards, I shook you while your eyes opened, disoriented and bewildered at the scene between the both of us.
You truly hate me, don't you, Fei?
That's what you should do because I can't push you away.
I have to make you go away, but I just can't make you choose it either.
RIIIP!
The buttons of his shirt flew in every which direction. Then, I pulled on the belt of his pants so that he would come closer to me.
"Nii-sama..." He said as he looked at me with those trusting eyes transforming into oracles that showed how much I crushed him under all the chains I personally put upon him.
The invisible tears were bleeding out of me.
My eyes stung as I grabbed his collar and shook him. Then, I pushed him to the ground and pinned his wrists to each side of him. "So tell me why did you believe that Japanese's word over mine?!"
He opened his mouth, but his eyes turned away at the mention of the Japanese.
This made me want to murder the Japanese even more.
Your mouth tried to protest, "Because..."
"Because what?!" I shouted impatiently.
Your eyes turned back to meet mine, but they held a hint of defiance.
No...
This was it, wasn't it?
My hands were on his neck. My thumb softly pressed against his Adam's apple.
And for the first time in my life, I said aloud what exactly was running through my mind:
"Why did you choose him over me?!"
I desperately held onto your cheeks as I was leaning forward.
"Because he reminded me of how you used to be!"
What the hell are you doing?!
I stopped in my place.
Then, the innocent Fei I had always known, despite all I had done, put his right hand over mine and kissed me on the cheek with half of my lips touching his.
Misaimed or not,
done carelessly or with precision,
I didn't know at all.
He let go and got up.
Tap, tap, tap...
His footsteps were getting louder and louder in my ears even though he was walking away from me so slowly.
In a grave, but rebellious tone, the words shot into my heart worse than any assassination I had ever assigned him to:
"I'm leaving you, Nii-sama."
Click went the closing of the door,
as quietly as the loudest, most inhumane cry scraping for survival.
That was the moment I went crazy.
And I didn't know what anything else meant.
The humanity I had tried to save through his forgiving eyes...
The 'normal' life I had built up with Fei...
The one place of sanctuary I had found in the world...
There was no meaning in anything anymore.
It had all fallen apart.
/"I'm leaving you, Nii-sama."/
*/*/*/*
/Around April, a month after being adopted, he dropped an expensive vase that had been in the family for generations. Still inexperienced with martial arts and scared of being scolded, he darted off faster than I could blink my eyes.
"Why did you run away?" I said as I squeezed under the house just below the den. "Why are you hiding here?"
"Because I'm going to get in trouble. That's what they did-"
"If anything ever happens to you here, Fei, I will protect you."
He looked at me with those wide eyes of his.
"Here, I am your brother. I'll always be your brother."
I pulled his bloodied hand and made him go to the bathroom. I washed his hands in between mine. And as I sat on the toilet, I made him sit in my lap so that I could wrap the bandage around his right hand.
Then, I patted it. "Does it hurt now?"
"Only just a little."
"Here. I will do a little magic so that it'll heal faster."
He blinked at me with those sparkling eyes of his. "What?"
I brought his bandaged hand to my lips. I kissed it.
He blushed. "Why'd you do that?"
"That's love."
I cleared my throat and pushed him away from my lap. I headed towards the door and stubbornly replied, "You didn't actually believe that, did you?"
And I left as soon as I felt my cheeks turn red.
Gradually, I began to put Father and everything else between us.
For if I truly touched you, I would do the things that were running through my head and they would stain you.
But this life had tainted you in another way...
"No! Send me instead, Father!"
Father shook his head. "You are the heir and Fei Long has been trained for this as much as you have. This is his place."
"But-"
I was only a fifteen-year-old boy trying his best for his only sibling.
"Yanzhui!"
And in the end, I had been there.
I took down my defensive stance and hugged him as he knelt over the bathtub as the snow fell softly to the ground outside the window. Somewhere, there were drops of red making a trail to our very place.
You were rubbing your hands and your long hair. "Take it off. The blood is there," your barely audible voice echoed on the tiles of the bathroom.
And I held you so closely from behind. "I couldn't do anything, Fei. I'm sorry."
"This is why I am here," he said while crying. "This is why I exist for this family?"
No, that wasn't true at all...
He was only how old when he first killed someone.
And those eyes changed.
I didn't help by pushing him away as he became more and more pretty in my eyes...
...wanting to dominate him in a way that shouldn't have been./
And now, I see things in flashes.
My memories and the gunshots with all the shouting are all one big cloud of confusion before me. I'm falling in the hallway as the Japanese escapes.
You are the person who took him away from me.
I shall never forgive you. For as long as you live, I hope your most significant person will be taken away...
...and then you'll know only 1/16th of the pain I feel at this very instant, growing deeper and more vengeful as the seconds pass.
The chaos is getting louder, but my ears are clogging up, selectively muting itself of the outward inflictions.
But before my eyes blurrily want to close completely, my beloved comes and supports me. I blame you for leaving father when we know now it really means me. In a small moment, you hold me closer and kiss the top of my head.
You cry as if you've always known the secret I could never say to you...
That I loved you more than anything...
"Foolish Fei..." I tease as I grab your hair and wrap it around my hand one last time.
I pull you towards me and kiss you with my blood pushing onto your tongue.
You kiss me back...?
Maybe I'm hallucinating.
Surely, you've hated me for all I've done to you.
"Nii-sama..." you tell me as your honest, crying eyes watch me while laying me gently on the ground. You whisper with a hidden conviction, my metal taste on your lips, "I have to go now."
/I blinked as I looked at the person before me, who hid behind the tall escort's leg. Your eyes peeked out as you clung onto the leg hesitantly. I just continued to stare at the beauty before me.
"This is your new brother. His name is Fei Long."
"That's a boy?" I pointed while all the adults laughed.
And months later, we became very close.
But I had found out a very sad thing. I sat on my bed and cried.
"What's wrong, Nii-sama?" You leaned your head on my shoulder.
I wiped my tears with the back of my hand. I was always macho and prideful that way. "Nothing."
"You were crying."
"Quit it, Fei."
You hugged me as you looked at me persistently.
I gave in.
"Father got mad at me."
"For what?"
"I didn't understand what marriage meant. They told me that I was supposed to marry the girl that came today."
"Marry?"
"As in, I become her husband when we grow up."
"Where will I go if you do that?"
I stared at him. I held onto his hand that held the small scar from that broken vase.
"I'm not. I said I'd marry you."
"Can you do that?"
"Father said it was impossible."
Disgusting...
"But what if I asked you, Fei Long?"
"I want to always be with you, Nii-sama. No matter what."
"That's what I want too. But things can't work out that way."
"Why? Why, Nii-sama?" Your lip quivered.
"Because that's how it is."
I tried to keep calm, but all the more, I cried inside./
They say that when you die, your life flashes before your eyes.
But for me, nothing ever mattered, but that one moment in my life when he told me that.
Even if it became more warped as the years went by, it was all the same to me. Your clarity of heart never changed. Mine made you doubt.
As I blink my eyes sleepily, you turn one last time to look at me with that worried, yet determined face of yours.
Then, you leave when I close my eyes.
Through all the things we've had to go through,
Through all the sacrifices we ever made,
For all the things I gave up...
It was worth it to have you
look at me that one last time.
"I will remember."
But you and I never had to say such unnecessary things, did we, Fei?
Not knowing if I'll survive or not,
now, I smile as best as I can.
"Live long and live for yourself, Fei."
That's all I ever wanted for you.
I want you to find the life
you breathed into me.
I gave you my heart the moment I kissed the scar on your hand,
hoping you'd remember your bittersweetness
mixed with your memories of me.
Owari.
-
Author's note: I know it's a strange pairing. I don't know why, but this image of Fei came into my head three days ago and I wanted to make a fic with his brother. That's why I asked the Yamane-sensei lj community for help. Fortunately, Lysalie28-san gave me the info I needed, but I didn't want to reveal I was in the process of making the fic that she was wondering about. ^_~ (And thank you for the help!)
As you can see, it came out more shounen ai than I had planned. I thought about it long and hard and hope that I was able to convey my thoughts and feeling for these characters. (So, I hope I got them correctly. ;_;) I had to decide what and whose perspective to use as well as the 'memories' I would convey in their interactions. All in all, I really was absorbed with these two for three whole days. The poem in the beginning took forever because I wanted it to set a tone.
Well, I hope you enjoyed the trip with me because it was difficult, but fun to write. ^_^ I went to sleep at an insane hour because of insomnia and my determination to have this done 'cause that's just how steadfast and stubborn I am.
I really wanted to show how much I love this title with a twist of using these two particular characters. And so, I picked the title to reflect both of them.
Take care until next fic.
Love always,
your humble author
yui