Notes: I don't own Digimon, nor do I have anything to do with it. If you actually thought that I did, then I pity you. I also don't own Velvet Goldmine, which the title of this comes from. This story contains shounen ai; that means m/m content. Consider yourself warned. It's also pretty sad, so whatever. Enjoy and don't forget to review.
* * * * *
"Hey, babe? I'm going to go over there. Okay?" A hand reached up to point towards the back wall of the bookstore.
A dramatic groan came out of his partner's mouth. "You're going to leave me for the psychology section? How will I ever be able to survive?" He added a fake pout for emphasis.
His antics were rewarded with a laugh. "Sociology section, and I'm sure you'll find some way." The blond leaned in for a peck on the lips before bounding off in search of whatever book he was looking for.
His boyfriend grinned after him for a second, mumbling words of amusement, before continuing to skim through "Soccer for Dummies". Although truth be told, he honestly wasn't sure why he was looking at it. His game was already perfect, and therefore this book could do him no good. But he skimmed through it anyway, trying to pass time until his boyfriend was ready to leave.
"Hey, fancy seeing you here!"
With a jump and a gasp, he quickly dropped the book and jerked around. "Mother of all…don't ever do that again! Didn't your mother ever teach you not to…oh it's just you, never mind."
The older boy smiled sheepishly and bent over to pick up "Soccer for Dummies." "I apologize. It was rude to sneak up on you like that. But it was not my intention to scare you."
"I'm sure that it wasn't," he replied, trying to ignore the butterflies that had begun to flutter in his stomach. As far as he was concerned the two were standing entirely too close, and he feared that he might lose control of himself in a matter of seconds. You have a boyfriend, you have a boyfriend, you have a boyfriend.
The other boy took notice of his friend's nervous step back with a slight frown but decided not to comment on it. "So what brings you here?"
The question caused the younger boy to cock his eyebrow. "What do you mean?"
"Well you're not exactly the type to be hanging around in a bookstore, so I was wondering what brought you here."
His temper flared. "Not the type to be here, huh? What type would that be? The smart type? Am I not smart enough to be here?"
"No, I didn't…"
"So you're calling me stupid, are you? You think you're better than me, do you?" The auburn didn't know where this was coming from. He knew quite well what his friend meant, but yet that didn't stop him from making a complete idiot of himself.
"That wasn't what I said!"
"No, but it's what you meant. Admit it, you think I'm a brainless jock!"
"Dammit, I do not!"
"You do too!"
"No, I don't."
"Yes, you do."
"I most certainly do not, although you're behaving like one now. I swear…I don't know what has gotten into you today."
"Well you know what…" he trailed off, suddenly realizing that in the course of the argument the two had moved even closer to one another. If we weren't fighting, we could be slow dancing, he thought dryly before glancing up.
Eyes met, causing both boys to tense. The world started to spin as they leaned closer, almost as if being pulled by an invisible force. And when their lips touched, everything surrounding them ceased to exist. Vision blackened for a second before changing to images of fireworks and heaven and angels. The sounds of a busy store faded into a soft ballad that existed only within their minds.
"I love you, Koushiro." It came out as a murmur but was heard loud and clear.
"I love you too, Daisuke."
Life, for the very first time in their lives, was perfect.
But something that you should know is that all things are perfect…and poisonous.
And a few feet away, unbeknownst to the two boys, a pair of blue eyes glazed over as their owner's heart broke painfully in two.
* * * * *
"There you are! I've been waiting here for hours! There's something I have to tell you, and I'm sooo excited and…Takeru? Takeru, what's wrong?"
Yamato gazed worriedly at his younger brother's faraway look and tear-stained cheeks. This was not good. He grasped Takeru's shoulders, his good news long forgotten.
"God, are you all right? What happened?"
There was no response at first, just a blank stare. But then his lips moved, although Yamato couldn't make out the words. It sounded like just a breath of air.
"What? I didn't catch that."
Takeru spoke again, a little louder this time but not much. "He lied to me."
The older boy's eyes squinted as he considered the words. "Who lied to you? What are you talking about?"
"He lied to me," he repeated, staring at his hand now. "He told me that he loved me." He paused, seeming to go over his words as he said it again. "He told me that he loved me." Tears filled his eyes. "Son of a bitch!"
The blond's foot suddenly reached out and kicked the wall nearest to him, causing a hanging picture to fall to the floor. Yamato quickly grabbed a hold of him, doing his best to restrain him. Unfortunately it didn't work, and when Takeru threw another kick he lost his balance and the two tumbled down.
"I hate you! Goddammit, I hate you! You told me that you loved me! I hate you!" he cried, continuing to slam his foot into the wall as though it were an actual person.
"Stop it," his brother hissed, grabbing his legs. "You're not helping anything doing that, so just stop it!"
"I don't care right now! I just wanna break something." Takeru glanced around, spotted a familiar looking coffee cup, seized it, and prepared to throw it.
"Oh no, you don't!" He snatched it away. "I made this thing when I was seven years old. It is my favorite coffee cup, and I am not about to watch you destroy it." The musician yanked a piece of hair out of his face, still clutching his beloved cup. "Now you wanna tell me what the hell you're talking about?"
"He told me that he loved me."
"Oh really? Well why didn't you say so? Now it all makes sense." Yamato rolled his eyes. "Who told you that he loved you?"
"Daisuke," the younger boy answered pitifully. "And I believed him too."
"I'm guessing that you love him." A nod. "And you think that he was lying when he told that?"
"I know that he was."
"How?"
Takeru sighed. "When you love someone, you normally don't kiss someone else in the middle of a bookstore."
His brother's eyes narrowed darkly. "No, I suppose that you don't." He immediately began to plot means of torture for the goggle-headed boy, but then he had a thought. "Who did Daisuke kiss?"
He buried his face in his knees. "Koushiro."
Complete silence, then…
CRASH!!!
Takeru jerked his head up to find Yamato staring numbly the wall.
"Come on," he said as he stood up, trying to stop himself from trembling. "Let's go get something to eat, and when we come back you can tell me all about it."
His younger brother merely nodded absently, his eyes focused on the broken coffee cup that had been chucked angrily at the wall only a few feet in front of him.
* * * * *
"…And I knew that Daisuke had a huge crush on him. He told me that when we first started going out last year, but I didn't think that he loved him and I sure didn't think that he still felt that way. But when I came back today, they were kissing…and it looked perfect, just like in those romance movies, you know, the ones that are so sappy and so fake that it makes you depressed to think about them. And they pulled back, just barely, and he said, 'I love you, Koushiro.' And he said, 'I love you too, Daisuke.' And I just…died."
A fresh set of tears started to spill from his eyes and Yamato pulled him into another comforting embrace.
"Why didn't you tell me that you and Daisuke were going out? I wouldn't have cared, you know."
"I know that, and I wanted to. But…I just couldn't. I tried so many times, but I always chickened out. I guess I was afraid that you'd be disappointed in me."
"I would never be disappointed over something like that, ever." He sighed. "So what happened after that?"
Takeru sniffled quietly. "I ran out. Daisuke saw me and ran after me. He said that he was sorry, that he couldn't date me anymore. He said that he did love me, just not in the way I loved him, that he loved Koushiro and that Koushiro loved him. And then he apologized some more. I told him that it was all right and wished him well." He glanced up and froze. "Why are you crying?"
Yamato smiled sadly at him and pulled away a bit. "Let me tell you a story, squirt." He took a deep breath and wiped his eyes. "Once upon a time there was a boy, a totally cool boy with great hair, who was completely and utterly in love with his best friend. I mean, this guy was seriously in love. He couldn't stop thinking about him, he did strange things just to be close to him, he wrote songs about him, he pretended he liked someone else to make him jealous. And no matter what he did, he knew that he'd always be in love with this kid."
Takeru grinned fondly. This story reminded him of how he felt about Daisuke. Well, before all this happened of course.
His brother continued. "Then one day this boy decided to tell his friend how he felt about him. So he tried about a hundred times and chickened out each and every time. Then one night he gathered up his courage and told this kid flat out that he loved him. And he found out that his feelings were returned, and he thought he was in heaven. The two spent the whole night in passionate bliss under the stars."
Yamato looked wistful for a long moment before a dark cloud spread across his features. Takeru got a nervous feeling as he waited for the rest of the story.
"Years passed by, and the relationship grew stronger. Then one day a bunch of new kids came into the scene. Almost immediately the two boys started having problems. Then a few nights later, this boy's boyfriend confessed that he'd started having feelings for one of the younger kids. And it hurt. I mean, he promised that he wouldn't act on them and that he still loved him, but…it still hurt."
As a few more tears slid down his brother's cheek, Takeru started to feel sick.
"A few more years pass, and the boy thinks that the worst his over, that his boyfriend had gotten over this crush. And then one night his boyfriend proposes to him, and he's positive that they're going to be okay."
He paused once again to fiddle with his ring finger. A gasp escaped from the younger boy's mouth as he spied the glint of a gold ring. Yamato sighed and held up the band for his brother to see.
"Then this boy decided that he was finally going to tell someone about this kid he was going to marry. So he asked his brother to come over. And when he gets there, this boy learns that his brother's boyfriend and his fiancé are in love. And he finally understands why the suicide rate is so high."
The silence that followed seemed to last hours, although it was only a few minutes. Takeru was the first to speak.
"Oh my God, I'm so sorry."
"Yeah, so am I," he replied. "But I'll get over it. I hear that Taichi's available these days." He made an attempt to laugh, but it came out as a loud sob. "I'm sorry. I'm supposed to be comforting you. This has got to be horrible for you too."
The young blond made a dismissing hand motion before wiping his eyes. "Are you going to throw it away?" he asked, pointing at the gold band that his brother was twirling.
Yamato gazed down at it with an unreadable expression and then slid it back onto his finger. "No, not just yet. I want to wear it for a few days, just so that I can remember what it was like."
"Okay, I understand."
There was a long silence between the two. Both were lost in their own thoughts and memories. It was Yamato who broke it.
"Hey, squirt?" he asked, his voice cracking. "Did they look happy together?"
Takeru paused, considering it. "Yeah, they did. They looked happier than I've ever seen either of them."
"Good. At least I get a little comfort in that, knowing that he's happy."
"Are you gonna be all right?"
"Yeah, I'll get over it eventually I suppose. It just hurts that I had to hear it from you and not Koushiro, and especially after we…" he trailed off, staring at his ring again. "Are you gonna be okay?"
"Yeah," he answered with a pained expression. "God, we're pathetic aren't we? Just sitting here, crying it off?"
Yamato laughed shortly. "Yeah, I guess we are."
And once again the two blond brothers lapsed into a thoughtful silence.
* * * * *
The two waltzed into the café, fingers entwined and faces smiling. Love struck gazes met and grins widened. The taller boy leaned closer and placed a small kiss on the other's lips before pulling him playfully towards the nearest table.
Nearly every person in the small café paused to watch the exchange. A couple merely a few feet away smiled fondly while a group of girls let loose a chorus of 'Aww', and a waiter gave them a knowing look.
And yet in a corner of the quaint building, two figures, both with deep blue eyes, watched them sadly. And when the lovebirds leaned forward for another kiss, both of them looked away just as identical crystal tears slid slowly down their cheeks.