Author's notes:
I have always wanted to write a fic like this, so let me know if this is ok or not by kindly leaving a review after you are done reading it…please, please, please?
Inspired by Sakamoto Ryuichi – Bachata and 30 seconds to Mars – The Kill
I would recommend that you listen to Bachata (I think Youtube might have it…or somewhere on the internet) while reading this fic. I am not sure if it will provide you the same intensity as it provided me with…but I hope it will create an ambience that would bring alive the necessary emotions that are described in my writing, while you are reading it.
Falter
Coldness encases
Your barely pulsing heart
Feel your soft cheeks
Beneath my hand
Your disappearing warmth
Your imminent demise
-Cattyfuzzy
When the world is asleep, he serenades the moon and in the dawning darkness he pours out his secrets in a quicksilver flow, and that flow that never reaches the bluish moon always only puddles around his feet. Often as he watched his surreptitious yearnings fade away he would ask himself, what is eternity to one human life when it does not even live to see it, much less to understand it? It was only pointless that such a vague and unachievable promise was made to him.
He was being eaten up from the inside and that disease that crawls along his arteries, was such a disdainful curse to his existence. But he could not blame anyone because like everything else that lives by the rules of this universe; everything was preordained, written out like a well worn path waiting for a lonely traveler to thread on. And he on the grand totality of things…would only last like a wisp of smoke, a trackless and sterile existence.
While his excessive pessimistic emotions dig out a black whorl in the centre of him, he carries on living inside himself watching that person outside eat, breathe, laugh and stumble through this stagnate life, and he rests and sleeps. Because only sleep will bring along dreams and the grandiose landscape of another life where he does not feel as if he is sleepwalking through series after series of nothingness, where the details does not matter and he isn't a stranger to himself.
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He stared at the mess of blonde golden silk enveloped by the luxurious cotton linens and fluffed up down pillows, and wondered why did he choose someone so difficult to love. Then he wondered again, if it was his choice at all. It had been so long but he was still like an unfamiliar person to him, it felt like he loved the blonde's soul but he would never be able to recognize it. It creates a longing and restlessness that never ceased to haunt his passion and test his fidelity.
He traced his index finger along the dipping curve of the blonde's spine and bent down to nuzzle the graceful arch of his neck, feeling the feathering tickle of his hair at the tip of his nose. He took a deep breathe and immersed himself with the rich scent of lemon flowers and red poppies. Mysteriously, it made him miss the peacefully sleeping blonde and he wondered how that was possible when he was barely a breath away.
It should be normal he thinks; that incommunicable space that exists between them, unbridgeable.
What was he to do to get him to open up and trust him? How is he to gain the warmth of his one true love? This body that he had loved so many times and tasted in so many ways, he has never felt it heat up with ardor. Sometimes he grew resentful of the blonde's distance and he would itch to lash out, break everything and end it all. But there was nothing he could do; only to bare his body and keep burning the blonde, hoping futilely that one day he would be scorched. Because he could not say those three words to him…and the blonde refused to believe in forever.
So they will remain there, perched on the precipice of unease, not being able to see the sorrows and regrets awaiting them…a written path of lost love and bitter realities.
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The sea roars out its impatience at the cliffs obstructing its path and showed off its strength to the clear blue sky, such a waste of energy because the earth won't move and the sky won't drop and the sea will forever remain in the cradle of its own depth. Just like where he would be when in an eternal sleep…in the cradle of Mother Earth's bosom, a return to nature, dust to dust, emptiness to emptiness and all that remains are tears to be wept dry, grieves to be forgotten and a silent but relentless continuation of life.
He thought about the time he has left. He thought about that somebody who would be most distraught and devastated by his demise. He thought about how to avoid letting this person feel the same desperate despair that will leave him consumed by darkness and a never-ending apocalypse.
A cruel affliction; to what intentions and to which end would be more benevolent? To allow him to witness the end of a life and watch as it wither away or, to leave everything at its happiest and most glorious moments so that he whom he had once loved, will not have to gain the acquaintance of death.
And therein lays his dilemma.
Death flows right beside the stream of life, an inevitable stop for all humanity. How does one avoid knowing it?
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Changes, it shows its subtle progress in ways that is as mysterious as the synchronicities of life, it moves you every other way like how your emotions would flow while listening to the pieces that great composers wrote. The blonde had changed too in many ways he could not understand or, maybe he could not bring himself to see the truth of it.
The elements whisper the deep seated familiarity of truth, weighing with the ultimate knowledge that he cannot evade the certainty of the blonde being and not being, leaving him no place to question the shades of doubts. But he will choose instead to close the curtains and terminate such oppressively sorrowful thoughts because the blonde was still with him, full of vitality and the signs of whatever that burdens him was nowhere in sight.
It was a painful sort of blindness he managed to invoke. He dulled the perceptive administrations of his mind and re-enacted another reality within. He pretended that the lackluster hair that was growing thin was not happening, he refused to see the disappearing spark in sapphire blue eyes, he stopped caring about the dizzy spells the blonde experienced and started the distillation of crucial transfiguring of the blonde's weakening state.
It was the only way he knew on how to keep himself living through each day with falsified hopes, and a marginal level of sanity to maintain the pillar of their arduous relationship that was inundated with restrained passions.
And since this was how it goes, they simply drifted apart even when their bonds are tied and their hearts were espoused.
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The blonde placed his fork down on the plate, trying to stifle the upcoming bout of nauseating sensation. He felt the excruciating ache start in the left side of his head and then travel down the curvature of his spine, ending in a hot spark of numbness that heated up his organs. He feels the general lack of stamina and an interminable fatigue that refuses to get its claws off him.
It had been ten years since he was diagnosed and he was repeatedly told by many that he should count his blessings, because it was more then a miracle that he is still alive. But he could not agree because what joy was he to feel when everything he gained was only meant to be lost?
It would not be soon now…where a time will come when everything will end. He only prays for courage to be able to face the day when it comes. Shall he reconsider his selfish decision? He wanted and needed someone to share his pain but this burden was too much for someone else to bear and he could see how fearful the red eye man was of his mortality.
Was anyone not?
But it hurts and it hurts because he felt like he could not placed his faith on him, that despite everything he was turned away and left to face the cold, weary and alone. Maybe it was all his fault from the start…maybe he should have never allowed himself to fall in the first place and save them all from this needless hurt and suffering. There were so many things he wanted to say to him and so many things he wished he could have done, but everything was too late and what could be done was too little.
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The operator's voice was getting impossible to listen to and he growled in frustration and slammed the phone down with a bam, but that didn't garner satisfaction enough to calm his fraying nerves. In his heart the looming solicitousness and curiosity tainted with morbidity took over, and he knew somehow that the crumpled and soggy note might be the only thing he will ever receive from his lover.
Yet he does not want to extinguish hope, he does not want to believe in the actuality and he does not want to feel that soul destructing heartache or anguish.
He would live in denial for the rest of his life if it only means that the blonde could be alive.
That supposed knowing will be enough.
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He breathe in deeply as the foreign wind blew across the cold vacant room, he watched the hands of time creep towards the dawning hours. Sleep evaded him again tonight, as it has for a long while. He still isn't used to this sanitized environment with its white walls permeated with the stench of death, which the bleach or pine disinfectant failed to cover. He misses those strong warm arms that would wrap around him in sleep, he misses the deep calm of that voice saying goodnight and he misses the monotony of life's ordinary moments that were spent with that person.
This nostalgia…it comes and it goes and he can't hold on long enough to catch his breathe, so he had to let go. He wanted to follow the disappearing clouds and leave this somber heartache behind; he wanted to search for a wide piece of southern sky and evergreen where he could call his own. But he remains lost in the reality of his pending demise and the overwhelming connection to a certain someone he couldn't break.
He looked over to the sofa where his sister was laying in a deep sleep, her cheeks still held the rosy hue and the peace of a person who was yet to be disillusioned by life. Unmarred and unpossess and full of dreams unbroken.
How free.
And he was insanely jealous that she still has that privilege to enjoy what was so brutally taken away from him.
On the wall, the clock was still ticking away.
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Tomoyo counted the familiar faces she saw at the funeral and searched for a man with red eyes, the man that her brother spoke so often about. She wondered if he was informed because her brother had left her no details. Through her tears and grieve, she watched her parents mourn for the son they never knew and she cried some more for the regrets her brother carried with him into the afterlife.
He never spoke much about his private life but she was given glimpses of it at times when he was feeling cheerful and well enough. She knew of what the red eye man was to him and she knew of that great love that would never bear fruit. Her brother believed even onto death that she was perfect, blessed and not someone who is jaded. He forgot that she as a living being and as a part of his flesh and blood, that she was able to experience his every occasion and emotion in life. She saw in the corner viewing his life as a third party the burdens he carried, the weaknesses, the strength he fought to have and the tragedies he lived through. She was in part as jaded as one could be. She had grown alongside a man who had taught her much about life and love, even though he had not believed in both.
She swiped at her eyes, trying to wipe away the burn at the same time. She wanted to do something for him. If love was forsaken in due to her brother's ephemeral existence, maybe hope would suffice enough to bring strength to those who are still living…to that red eye man who will never hold her brother again. Would she be able to offer him the opportunity of the reconciliation of his soul so that he could continue living and learn to love again?
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He fingered the bright neon memo pad in which the address was scribbled on and looked out of the window of the cab with a wry smile. Three years together and he never really knew where he lived; he has no knowledge of his family, his childhood or his history. He only knew the man he met in that gallery one fateful day and the blonde remained till now, a mysterious enigma.
He remembers the first time he laid eyes on that pair of beautiful sapphires that shines more brilliantly then the northern star at night. It captures his attention and demanded his heart, and the fragile guarded gaze that beckons at him, took over all his thoughts. He remembers the first time he heard that voice, and he was brought down on his knees because he had a haughty disregard for the cliché term called 'love at first sight', and he was disproved of it in mere seconds, by himself nonetheless.
He remembers the first time they made love, their coming together so profound and their movements so lyrical that the memory of it seemed to be pieces from a dream. He could still hear the quiet gasps, the shallow bridle breathing and the soft murmuring of the blonde's voice saying his name when he approaches climax. He could still feel the satin smooth texture of that pale expanse of pearly white skin, the sharp protrusions of hipbones and the tight grip of fingers on his neck and biceps.
Everything branded an invisible tattoo on him, a remembrance of the blonde engraved into the marrows of his bones. He was owned without being possessed, he was held without being consumed. He is enslaved by a man whom he would probably never unravel, never loved even when he loves.
He remembers without being remembered because for all they have been through, they were still strangers to the stranger within themselves.
And the woman who called him…their voices were so alike.
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Her face still carried with her the streaks of grieve and her sullen eyes soften in tender recognition and apology when she saw him. The severe blackness of her dress and the somber tension surrounding her made him nauseous; a dark presentiment crawled and wrapped itself around his slowing heartbeat. In that moment he knew he should walk away, walk away and not listen to whatever that she was about to tell him. Because he knows that there will be no more lies for him to fall back upon and the hard ground of reality will shatter his fragile white porcelain bones, render him useless and unable to fight the brutal truth that fate had gifted to him.
She invited him into the house with a soft tremulous voice, wavering and seemingly about to break at any given moment. She looked around the empty house bearing the knowledge of what was lost to her and the family, unsure of where she could find a safe harbor to anchor her grieves and focus on her guest. She walked past the dining table once, twice and fingered the vase of plastic flowers set in the centre of it before gesturing for him to come over and take a seat. She sat down hesitantly after him and met his eyes with tear brimmed ones, trying to speak yet unable to push the words past her lips.
But words were meaningless to him in this incomprehensible clarity. He knew without hearing an affirmation. The intransigence of grieve upon knowing the passing of a loved one was not incorporeal and the suffocating tendrils of anguish that wraps itself around one's throat, deprives one of oxygen leaving one to a slow painful death called heartbreak.
He asked how long he had been gone, choking out the words in a clumsy whisper, his palms growing sticky and numb. He watched her pushed forward a small urn wrapped in a light blue cloth, the meaning in her gesture was obvious enough but that was not what he wanted to see at this moment. He wasn't even sure if he could bring himself to touch it.
It was only then that he learned the truth of everything. The blonde had indeed been ill for a long time and the courage to speak to him about it never surfaced. She told him that he couldn't decide which would hurt less for him. To let him know that he did loved and that he's dying while at it or to leave him with only the best memories and keep him in the dark.
Both notions of good intention were seemingly as cold and callous.
He listened to the woman whom he know now as the blonde's sister, with an outward show of calmness as he blinked away the discomfort in his eyes, a strange sort of sensation one experienced when the tears refuses to flow.
So many words were spoken and the past was revealed.
All he can register was the fact that he was loved as he clutched at the urn containing the blonde's ashes.
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He ran and ran along the gritty dirt path, the indolent breeze chasing behind him rustling the leaves that lay rotting on it but he could not shed this sadness that soaked his soul and pervades his every open pore. He could not rid himself of the echoing avalanche of memories that fills his mind so full to the brink that he wished his head would detonate. His footsteps reverberate with the resounding silence of the woods where foreign sounds drown themselves out in the crowns of the gentle tall oaks, never making them known to whoever passes by its lonely trails. All that is left is the drawn out cry of a lost falcon and the knocking pebbles that his shoes had kicked aside.
He does not know what to do with this sadness, no matter how many months had passed, it still poured out of him, a sweeping conundrum he cannot abandon. So like the changing colors of the maple leaves in autumn, he shed away the colors of life and donned the colors of mourning on his soul. He slowed down his footsteps as he neared the edge of the cliff. This was the place where he scattered the blonde's ashes. He chose this place because of its tranquility and undying beauty, the majesticness of the landscape and the contours of its wooded edges cuts its inhabitants off from the chaotic world that exists outside of its borders. It was in other words, a tiny piece of paradise. He thinks the blonde will love this place, where he could now roam free in eternity and they could be alone for awhile.
"Kuro-san…"
"Humm…"
"Would you be happy without me?"
"I don't know…I never thought about that before. We're still young, don't be so morbid."
"But things happen…"
"Can we not talk about such things? I haven't seen you in a week…"
He gave a bitter smile as the memory of that conversation came to him. He realized that perhaps it was he himself that stopped the blonde from ever talking about what was weighing in his mind…perhaps it was his own fault that so much precious time was lost.
Whichever…
He has only a less then half a lifetime to wait before he could see the blonde again.
As he turned to leave, he lifted his head towards the balmy sky and he thought he heard the blonde's voice whispering to him as the breeze grazes by. He didn't know why but the tears started flowing and he realizes that he will never be able to accept the fact that he was gone, and the pain of living with regrets stabbed deep into his heart. So he remained there for a long while as he bawled his sorrows out like a child and groveled in the ground at his monumental lost, clutching and clawing at the hard stones and weeds that littered the ground around him, until the sun started to set and the tears started drying up.
And he said softly to the air around him, wondering if the blonde could hear…
"This lock you have put on me…I can't undo it...Fay…."