Disclaimer: I don't own YGO or any of its characters, and I am not profiting from this fan work.
Warnings: Blink-and-you'll-miss-it drug reference.
If I Should Look Back
1.
3AM and the baggage carousel at LAX had been dipped in blue. The lights, the buzzers, the scratching hum of people talking around her like she wasn't even real – an itch she couldn't scratch; maybe she was dreaming after all. Everything was in slow motion, like a dirge she couldn't quite get out of her head. 3AM and she hadn't slept in three days.
A sudden jolt as the carousel began to move, black scales shimmying across a vast, serpentine body, and she had to blink because she could almost hear the hissing. She watched the first bags run past her almost unseeing; her bag was black with a green ribbon but she couldn't tell the difference. Everything was the same colour, after all. Everything was blue.
In the end she had to wait until all of the other bags had been collected, when she could pull the lone remaining suitcase off of the curling, rattling belt and hope that it was indeed hers. It felt wrong under her fingertips. She trailed after the others, the small crowd more like wisps of grey and purple smoke in her vision. The security guard watched her warily, but when she tried to look at him and smile she faltered, because where his eyes should have been she saw only rain and skeleton trees.
At the tail end of the line organizing to go down the escalator, she couldn't help but notice the night wrapping itself around the man in front of her. He was too tall, it would hurt her neck if she looked up, and she was afraid of seeing the stars, anyhow. Still, even dressed in night with his black suit, the untiring way he held himself ripped at her memories. She pressed her lips together and willed herself to see through the hours of lying awake and wishing for morning. For just a moment there was a spark of electricity up her spine and pictures – bright, vivid, colourful pictures – flashed through her head, a movie strip on speed.
Yugi, laughing. Jounouchi arguing. Honda and Shizuka covering their smiles behind their hands. Bakura tilting his head. A tall – too tall – man in a long white coat, walking away.
She had to gasp to catch her breath, and there was still no air in her lungs to make any sound escape when she opened her mouth.
Too late, they were at the bottom, and he walked away and into the blue haze without ever turning around. A name rolled around her mouth like a pebble she couldn't swallow, but she never said it out loud. She preferred to not know. In the distance she could see a red sign marked 'exit', and she tightened her hand around the handle of her luggage, realizing that the ribbon rubbing against her palm was a lovely seafoam green.
When she got into the cab and handed over the address, she thought about a time – many, many years ago – when she had sat under a stand of yew trees behind a school building made of red brick and silver glass and white plaster, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear against the breeze.
Later she would never remember the trip to the hotel through the winding LA streets, checking into the too-opulent lobby, or finding her way to her room. The only thing she remembered was that that night she slept for the first time in three days. She did not dream.
2.
When she saw him again, it was almost as if he'd been waiting for her.
The ballroom glittered around her, making her head spin in a way that the champagne alone hadn't managed. An emerald-green cocktail dress swirled past her, and for the first time that night she wondered if she were drunk. The reflections of chandeliers sparkled in the punch and perfectly white diamond smiles greeted her everywhere she went.
"Anzu, Anzu my god! It's so good to see you!"
Lena appeared from nowhere, from some facet of the jeweled ballroom. She was dripping gold brocade and ruby lipstick and her eyes were as bright as the fluorescents glimmering up above.
"Of course I'm here, Lena!" she replied with as much pleasure as she could manage. "You look amazing. Congratulations." They shared a quick hug, all pale arms and cool skin, and then Lena took her hand and squeezed it gently with an easy smile.
"LA is amazing, but I miss you something awful. You should just move out here and keep me company all the time."
"I miss you too," she informed the gold and silver woman with honesty that unsettled her. "I really do. I'll try to come and visit more often."
"You'd better," Lena replied, and her grin offered suggestions she didn't need to add out loud. "LA is a wicked town, but it's just so much fun! We'd go out dancing all night every night."
"Maybe you would," she said, her own smile secretive. "But I'm getting too old for that kind of thing."
"Oh right," was Lena's only answer, before she was swept off into the glamorous crowd with a laughing promise to return. The party shimmered on and people twirled past her, full of smiles and laughs and painful recognition.
"Anzu!"
"Anzu, is that you?"
"Anzu I love your dress!"
"Anzu!"
She had to retreat to the back wall to catch herself and stop the room from whirling faster than any of the dancers. Her hands shook a little and she raised one to her left breast as if to ask her heart to please stop beating double, triple, quadruple time. It paid no real attention. For a moment she thought maybe, maybe this was –
"Mazaki."
In the strange way that such things happen, the low rumble of his voice made her certain she was drunk while also rooting the walls to their foundations, so that they finally had to stay still. The contemptuous amusement in his voice was like a bolt of lightning, and when she turned on her heel to face him, she thought perhaps her heart was now standing still.
"...Kaiba?"
"As if I could be anyone else."
His Japanese was fluid and elegant in a way nothing else at this party was, with its jarring culture of over-indulgent opulence. For the first time she felt pretty in her simple black dress.
"I... suppose not." And she laughed a real laugh, because Kaiba Seto could never be mistaken, not when she was fully awake. He was dressed in the deepest black with a midnight tie, and his razor-sharp eyes were still as blue as she remembered. In truth he looked so similar to her memories that it was almost startling, as if he'd barely aged while the rest of them had gone on about their silly little lives. The only real tell-tale trace of all of the years that had passed were the lines at the corners of his eyes and mouth which hinted tantalizingly that perhaps he had finally learned to smile.
He regarded her coolly for a long moment in that way he had of summing people up into their base total with only a glance, but unlike the times he had done it in their childhood, she didn't feel herself wanting. Afterwards, he turned to stand beside her so that they could both regard the party that was content ignoring their existence.
"I'm surprised to find someone here who isn't a complete fool."
Instead of the indignation she should have felt for many of her friends, present and sparkling excitedly, she instead felt a well of pride to be differentiated from them.
"I came to support Lena. This movie will be her big break, and we were – are – friends." The words felt a little stilted on her tongue. She rarely had the opportunity to speak her first language these days. When silence was the only thing that met her explanation, she felt herself continue almost involuntarily.
"We went to Juilliard together. And after I... after I couldn't dance anymore, she never cared, and we stayed close."
"She is a brilliant dancer."
Although the words sounded like praise, the boredom and indifference laced through them was unmistakable. Unable to help herself – god help her, she still loved dance more than anything – she looked up at him with a frown.
"I assume you don't enjoy dancing much, then."
Still as before, he didn't so much as look at her. The silence dragged on for a moment, and she set her jaw before looking away as well.
"...I prefer artists who articulate themselves in more readily comprehensible ways. Writers, for example."
She had to glance back, then, once again compelled by the warning thunder that was Kaiba Seto's voice. His eyes met hers and sparked. Whether the colour that rose to her cheeks was from the champagne or the compliment that had just been directed at her was a question she didn't dare address, not then.
"...I wasn't aware that the great Kaiba would follow the career of a lowly journalist such as I."
He shrugged then, the mask of indifference once again settling over his face and the set of his shoulders, and she had to do her utmost not to walk away at that moment.
"Why are you here?" she asked him, trying not to sound accusing.
"I'm one of the main financial backers of the film. It's a guaranteed success."
"Of course." She couldn't keep the resentment out of her tone completely that time.
He laughed, low and surpringly warm, and she looked at him sharply because it was a sound so alien and yet so welcoming. When he had finished, he regarded her with that assessing look once again, only this time it was tinged with a puzzlement she could find no explanation for.
"...it's an unexpected pleasure to meet someone here who speaks Japanese and recognizes artifice when she sees it." He raised one hand almost glibly, as if to imply that the whole room were the fraud, and the two of them the only ones who understood it. Unable to decide between being offended and flattered, she fixed him with a rather cold stare.
"You don't seem to have become any less rude."
"Perhaps," he answered, "but I don't believe that it's really for you to judge."
They stood again in silence for a while, neither speaking nor making any move to part when the music changed and many of the dancers exchanged partners. Finally, after what must have been years, Kaiba shifted with that cat-like grace she had never entirely forgotten.
"I suppose I should ask you to dance."
"What makes you think I'd say yes?"
He eyed her then with a different gleam in his eye, and a familiar smirk curved its way up his face.
"Your second mistake was making it a challenge."
"What-"
She wasn't finished the word let alone the question before he had taken her hand and was guiding her smoothly onto the floor. Her feet seemed to follow of their own accord whether she would or no, and when he curled one arm around her waist and threaded the fingers of his other hand through hers she felt as if the world had suddenly inverted itself. His hand was cool and steady, and he didn't hesitate as he pulled her right into the steps of the dance.
"...I thought you didn't like dance?"
"It has its uses."
His smirk grew wider then, and he led her confidently as though he couldn't possibly imagine her rebelling. He probably couldn't, she thought bleakly. Still she followed, although she couldn't say why exactly she felt both warmed and saddened as they moved quietly and serenely through the paces and steps, unbothered by the rest of the world. She studied him as they danced, and tried not to think about the fact that she could feel no ring on any of his fingers. Surprisingly it was Kaiba who broke the silence once again.
"Do you often keep in touch with the others? Mutou, Jounouchi. The others who followed Mutou like blind dogs."
"I..." If she had been red before, then now she became a dark crimson. Her eyes dropped to the floor. "...no."
He nodded, as if it made little difference, before adding in an uncaring tone,
"They're doing well, if you care to know."
By the time she'd managed to force her eyes back up to his, the song was winding to its inevitable conclusion and she could feel both finality and the dark blue of real night starting to steal into and over the room. It seemed even this much gaudy shine was not able to keep it at bay forever.
As they came to a careful halt, Kaiba gave her one last hard look before releasing her and taking a step back.
"Mazaki."
"...Kaiba."
He nodded slightly as though he were acknowledging her as... she wasn't sure what. She wanted to believe that it was as an equal, but the coldness in his eyes suggested otherwise. After that he turned and was gone, disappeared into the night once again with the shadows of laughing, arguing, smiling figures vanishing with him as though they'd never been at all.
Turning from the party, from the people, from the light, Mazaki Anzu walked with a straight back and a raised chin into the dark, while the black holes that Kaiba's shades once could have filled walked beside her every step of the way.
3.
The third and final time she met Kaiba Seto, all wrapped up in blue, there was no question that he'd been waiting for her.
"You're late," he said.
She raised an eyebrow, trying not to smile at the tall man sitting at the hotel bar as though he owned it.
"If I'd known I was keeping you waiting, I would have gone out the back."
"Unlikely," was his only answer before he returned to sipping a glass of what looked like brandy. Setting her handbag down on the top of the piano-like mahogany bar, she sat carefully on one of the tall chairs while fixing the man who seemed determined to keep her constantly out of balance with a slow stare.
"What are you doing here?"
"Waiting interminably, it seems. Are you ready to go out?"
"Go out? Kaiba, what..." She shook her head, willing him to either make sense or vanish, because even two nights of sleep were not enough to keep her from being deeply, interminably tired. Tonight she wore the blue like a shawl around her shoulders, the weight of it pulling her downwards like gravity.
"Since it is your last night in town, I thought perhaps you would like to see some of it."
"You clearly don't know me very well," she attempted to joke, but the heaviness of his eyes on her seemed to steal all the humour from her voice. It was like there was nothing else in the world that was important.
He shrugged again, his long fingers tracing the lip of his glass, and the empty hunger that had assailed her the night before returned to creep in the shadows, watchful and predatory. She knew well enough then that she would follow him, even though it be for tonight and tonight only, wherever it was that he might lead.
"Where are we going?"
"It doesn't really matter."
Putting the glass down on the bar alongside a smooth green bill she chose not to read, he stood and gestured towards the door. Without looking at the barman or at the other patrons, she stood as well and collected herself, taking a brief moment to smooth the anxious pleats from her black skirt. With eyes for no one but the man in the jacket the colour of the minute before daybreak, she walked out of the bar and never once looked back.
The limousine was waiting for them at the curb, purring, tensed and ready like the darkest jungle cat on the streets of Los Angeles. When he opened the door for her she was proud that she didn't hesitate, instead slipping into the waiting warmth with a grace that had eluded her for years now. The door closed softly behind her, and then there was a pause as Kaiba moved around to slide sinuously into the seat next to her.
The inside of the limousine was spacious, and the colour of caramel and cotton. Her eyes raked across it greedily, wanting to hold it all and file it away so she would always know what it felt like to ride in a limousine at the side of Kaiba Seto. The fifteen years that had passed since the last time they met had marked their changes on her in red pen, if not on him, and she no longer cherished the childhood fantasy that wealth and power bought nothing at all that mattered. She did not think of the glittering farce of a party the night before because this, with the body sitting close to hers, was not the same at all.
"Tell me about Yugi," she said, although it was the exact opposite of what she'd meant to say.
He laughed quietly again in that same strange way, and she settled herself into the seat to observe him with an honesty that she hadn't dared the night before. Outside the world began to roll past the vehicle, fleeting lights, billboards and glass that were of absolutely no moment at all reflected from dark doors.
"Mutou married five years ago, a little blond. He's running quite the empire himself these days."
The little smile that played around his lips showed more fondness than he might ever admit to aloud, and she found herself smiling.
"Good. I'm glad he's happy. Does he have kids?"
"Two. A girl and a boy."
"What about Jounouchi, is he well?"
Here a little moue of distaste, and she let herself laugh quietly because it was almost like they were children again, discussing likes and dislikes in the school yard with the whole future in front of them.
"I suppose. I still see him on occasion, and he never ceases to amaze and appall."
"That's good, too."
She continued to study his face, noting now that upon closer inspection he didn't look quite so young as she'd first thought. There was something about the way his cheekbones cast shadows than made her realize quite suddenly that Kaiba Seto was no longer eighteen, and he was very definitively here, with her.
"How are you? What's your life like now?" She asked quietly, her hand skirting where his hand lay on the seat, passing just close enough to feel the warmth of it.
"Busy," he told her shortly. Though when she continued to just watch him he seemed grudgingly to give in, something he would have never done all of those years and lifetimes ago.
"Kaiba Corporation uses up much of my time, though my younger brother has taken on many of my duties, so we now share ownership."
The obvious pride with which he regarded his brother was as clear as always, and this time she allowed their fingers to touch lightly. If he noticed, he gave no sign at all.
"I miss Mokuba, he was always so nice. I always admired his faith in his brother."
"Really?" he asked her, the harsh and mocking note in his voice exactly the same as she remembered. "You certainly had me fooled."
"Oh, don't be like that," she told him, surprised at the power she found. He seemed startled too. "It's been too many years to go back to the old bickering. Too much has changed."
"...perhaps it has." He allowed himself a wry smile, and the next question that came to her stuck and rasped in her throat like sandpaper.
"Are you... do you..."
"What?" His question was impatient but also a touch curious, and she would have continued if she could. But the shame of it blazed up her cheeks and made her mute. He watched her for a while, and perhaps found the answer to his question as a coldly satisfied look crossed his own face.
She shook her head quickly, trying to shake it away.
"Do you read the New York Times often?"
"Every morning."
"Strange, for a business man from Domino."
"Not particularly. The financial news is usually informative and up to date."
"Which would, of course, explain how you know that I write for the Arts section."
"I make it my business to know things."
She laughed one more time, as softly as if she'd sighed, and that puzzled look that had haunted him the night before returned slowly to Kaiba's face.
"There is something about you, Mazaki, that I cannot put my finger on."
Although her face settled into a serious expression, she did not bother to tell her eyes not to smile, or the rest of her to move father away from this man who sat slightly closer than he might.
"Oh, and what is that?"
"You chose a life for yourself that included only the things you carefully selected, and now you ask how they are."
There it was, finally. The dark blue, in the car with them. She could feel it around her but she tried to speak clearly.
"I was very young, back then. I... it's hard not to wonder how things would be different, if I had chosen otherwise."
"Would you have married Mutou yourself, then?" he asked mockingly, as if he couldn't imagine anything more pathetic.
"No," she answered, and held his eyes.
And then, wearing a dress and a diadem of blue, she leaned forward and kissed him, curious and wondering as if they were still eighteen-year olds, terrified but also aching for more. The feather-light touch of his fingertips against her cheek as his lips tested hers experimentally, cautious and cold as Kaiba ever was but not denying, not concealing his own curiosity. Silly as children they tested slowly, her heart beating like a drum in her chest as her palms went from warm to cold and clammy and back once again. For a moment she knew what it would be like to kiss this man, to know in her heart that she didn't need shadows because she could go back to the real thing, that the cold ache that followed her would finally, at the end of it all, be forever banished.
And then she blinked, and she had not kissed him, never even moved at all. Instead she sat watching it replay back at her, this impossible possibility, reflected in his eyes from her own. She had done nothing, and neither had he. Her shawl drew itself around her, and the cold settled in to stay.
He lifted his hand to touch her cheek gently, and after that they sat in silence for a long while.
Finally, after hours or perhaps only minutes or seconds, the car drew to a halt. It was gentle enough that she barely noticed - a feline sort of movement. Kaiba did not move, and after a breath her door opened, seemingly of its own accord. Confused, she looked from the open doorway to Kaiba Seto, who did not meet her eyes or turn his head towards her.
"Goodnight, Mazaki. Enjoy your trip home in the morning."
Uncertain and half expecting him to follow her out of the black limousine, she exited awkwardly and stood in front of her hotel once more, waiting. The driver, an undistinguished man with grey hair, closed the door again so that Kaiba disappeared from view. He nodded to her once and returned to the open driver's side door.
Alone on the curb she stood and watched as the vehicle pulled away, taking him out of her life for the third and final time. Her eyes were unreadable, and ghosts thronged the street.
0.
Sunlight was just starting to break over the horizon when she stepped out of the cab, the sky still murky but starting to be stained with something close to color, but not yet quite there. There was no color for her as she fumbled with the small, round object in her pocket, her fingers closing over it again and again as she stopped and started to withdraw it.
The black and blue cab rolled away almost silently, like sound went with colour now, and finally she withdrew it from her pocket. In the day it would be gold, like Lena, like a far away party in Los Angeles with only one person in the world she wanted to speak to.
Anzu put on her wedding ring, and walked up the steps to the apartment building she called home.
Inside the apartment, with the door sealed fast against the coming day and the curtains closed tightly, the dark surrounded her like a friend she'd forgotten to keep close. There was a murmur as the hazy black and blue man with a ring to match hers shuffled over to kiss her cheek, brushed her hair back, and then moved towards the kitchen. She said nothing. He continued his search for cereal without minding, assuming she was wrapped around with exhaustion.
Perhaps she was.
Finally, when she lay alone on her mattress in the comforting dark of her bedroom, then she finally let herself close her eyes, let her mouth open to shape the gasping hurt like an open wound, fifteen years ignored and now torn wide open. There were no stitches, no one to do the stitching, and she shook with her eyes pressed as tightly closed as if they would be shut forever.
When she did open them again her cheeks would be dry, and it would be time to choose a direction for her life. To leave or to stay, to go left or to go right, to sink or to swim. When she opened them again it would be daytime, and the time for dreaming without consequences would be finished, once and for all.
Knowing everything waiting on the other side of the clock's second hand and her prison-cell blinds, Anzu kept her eyes closed and waited.
A/N - I'm back, and yes it is for real. :D More info on that coming with the next chapter of Break, which will be up in the next two days or so. (It would be up already but NO I had to be randomly inspired to write Azureshipping first. Whatever, brain. Whatever.) For the record, this was inspired by the Sarah Slean song California.