Title: Eternity
Day/Theme: 2 October / but I am sick of time
Series: xxxHolic
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Watanuki, Yuuko, hints of Domeki/Watanuki/Himawari
A/N: I know this is bad, but I wanted to write and dammnit, I am not letting my lack of sleep preventing me from this.
Summary: This is the only thing that Watanuki understands about Yuuko.
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This is the only thing that Watanuki understands about Yuuko: the ever-stretching span of time. It grows and crawls and the days blur into months into years. Customers come and items go, moons change phases and the season roll in cycles. In the end, though, they all mix up into one big abstract painting.
There really is no point in telling time through shades of light and the steady hand of a clock, not when they all amount to nothing. He can't age, can't change, only watches the dying leaves and budding flowers with a practiced eye.
Watanuki can understand, only now, why Yuuko might have smiled when she disappeared all those years (or is it months? He can't tell) ago. Time is repetitive, without a stop button, and he sometimes tires of it too.
Only, unlike her, he has more of a connection to this time, to this present.
He counts the years through Domeki's steady gait and Himawari's grey hairs. Each wrinkle represents a year, each callous a week, and he tallies them up in his mind like a prisoner might in a cell.
(And this is another thing he understands about Yuuko, her desire to remain unconnected, because with each added strike he knows he's counting down and then they will be gone.
There will be no more smiles and slow stares and soft kisses and warm touches.
All that will be left will be him and that empty road called eternity.)