Disclaimer: I do not own K and no profit was mad from this story. It's just a little bit of fan-girl fun.
Summary: The thoughts going through Izumo's head in 12 days after the death of Tatara Totsuka.
12 Days
It was real easy for Kusunagi-san to forget that a few years ago a punk like Tatara Totsuka had been real annoying to them. Tatara wasn't even a punk, just some lame kid that came off clingy and awkward. His laugh always following them around and his hands between reaching out and pulling in. Kusunagi doesn't know how a kid like that ended up with punks like them.
Tatara wasn't a bad kid, his parents were still married and live in a quiet city suburb. He visited his grandparents in the county over vacations. His dad drank too much and always apologized with fresh flowers in the morning. His mother worked too much so the flowers never acted as a cover bruised apology.
Tatara was just a real strange kid, who one day called Mikoto his King and that works for Izumo.
The blond didn't fit in with most of HOMRA. He wasn't prone to violent attacks. He didn't enjoy blood shed. He cooked and played with cameras, wrote music and started garden, now gone to waste on Izumo's roof. His grades weren't bad, he didn't like school, but Uni hadn't been out of the question with him, if he'd wanted. He calmed Anna in her nightmares. Tatara kept their King calm, his sword still hanging.
One day, that scrawny kid, got his face punched in. A concussion, a broken leg , a sprained wrist, bruised ribs, and the print of some assholes boot on his cheek for them. For Mikoto. For telling some young wannabe's that some day soon they would want to be in the heat of the flame Mikoto would give. That they shouldn't disrespect a guy that would be a King.
So yeah, Kusunagi likes Tatara. He likes the spark and the laughter that always follows. He likes that hands that sometimes pulled in and often times clung desperate to bare shoulders.
The eleven days after Tataras' death are the worst. The memory of the blood and the wake HOMRA can't go to, and that Mikoto and he are forbidden to attend. The funeral they wait to finish so they can say their respects. The scent of smoke in the air, as the box in the county side goes up and up. Corse sounds in the winter; no blood, no bone, no ash. The image burned into his synapses, Anna's gloved hands lighting incense and candles. These are the worse days of his life. Until the twelfth day after Tatara death.
"In the end, you really were the best King we could ask for."