Notes: this was based on a prompt from smos a long time ago.
If the stars align
by: .zulka
genre: romance/angst
pairing: KaixHiromi
rating: T
prompt: hair dye, mocha, electric green fedora, feather boa, condoms, What the hell did you do to my cat?
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When Rei dropped the book, Kai merely glimpsed at him and then looked to the fallen book and the photo strip that had fallen out. His eyes narrowed.
"Hey isn't this—"
"Nothing." Kai replied sharply as he quickly picked the photo strip. It was Hiromi and him and on the back in her neat writing was the date. Five years ago. His face remained expressionless as he quickly threw the strip away into the nearest wastebasket. It was nothing after all. He walked away.
Rei watched him and kept quiet. He knew better than to talk. Salima had just arrived, he saw her through the window and sighed.
"I'll never understand why he's even with her." Mariah commented from her place on the sofa. "She's too bland for him, timid, scared more than half the time." Her dislike for the red-head was obvious in her tone of voice. "It gives me great satisfaction in knowing that if she ever shows up again, he'd leave that red-head in an instant."
Rei ignored her comments. He was used to them and knew that the real dislike for the red-head came from when Salima had a crush on him. Mariah had shown her fangs and claws then. That was years ago though. Just like the time when Kai and Hiromi had been together. He reached into the wastebasket to pick the photo. This dated to those days. Those crazy care-free days, when Max wore that ridiculous electric green fedora for months, and Tyson had an obsession with mocha, something Kai often mocked him for usually stating that it was nothing but foam.
"Oh, look at her all doe-eye. You know I heard that last time she came over, Mariam was rather nasty with her and that Kai didn't defend her."
"Hmm."
"I mean, shouldn't that hint at something?"
"Who knows, Kai is strange like that." Rei answered, and contrary to Maria he thought Salima was a fine person for Kai. The problem was that Kai was not over Hiromi. He stared at the photo strip. The first one had Hiromi smiling brightly with a scowling Kai next to her. The second one had them in a rather intimate moment. Hiromi was holding his face in her hands and was kissing him. The third had Kai with an arm around her shoulders while his gaze was off to the side, but Hiromi's smile was still bright.
"I think he wants her to grow a spine. Though I can't see that happening any time soon." Mariah muttered before returning to her magazine. Rei merely shrugged and placed the photo strip back in the book. He wasn't sure who had placed it there. He wondered then, if Kai had opened that book at all in the recent years.
"I thought, you know, that he would look for her. Before he started whoring around."
Rei turned to look at Mariah, leaving the book on the table. "He did. For a whole year."
"So," Mariah began as she closed her magazine, "is this thing between him and Salima like serious?" Rei shrugged. "I don't know. It's his business."
"Did he and Hiromi even break up?"
Rei gave her a side glance.
"Hello?" Rei called as he entered the apartment. It was quiet, which was a strange occurrence. He had just arrived from China, having visited his old village and Mariah the week before. He frowned.
"Kai?" the ex-team captain was sitting in the living room floor. Gaze vacant as he stared off into space.
"Where's Hiromi?" Rei asked as he walked around empty Chinese take-out boxes.
"She left." He told him.
Rei turned to look at him, puzzled he asked, "What do you mean?"
"She's gone."
Rei frowned. "Did you guys have another fight?" Living with both of them, though at first it had just been him and Kai, he had become accustomed to their fights as they tried to make the relationship work. Their compromises were a bit strange, he conceded, but it seemed to work. Or at least he thought it had.
"It's been a week."
Rei remembered well, that week turned into two, and three, and those three weeks turned into months. She never came back. Didn't call.
"What do you mean Tyson?" From the kitchen Rei listened to Kai's frustrated attempts to find her, none of them coming to fruition. Tyson, who had been her closest friend didn't even know where she was. Her mother had passed away a year ago. There was no one else to call, and it was with great effort that he had made a rather dejected Kai finally shower and clean. Though some things he refused to touch, while Plato the cat remained oblivious to Hiromi's absence.
"What the hell did you do to my cat?!" His yell was enough to snap Rei from his stupor. Mariah warily glanced at him. Both of them watched as Kai stormed in, furious. Salima, wide-eye came after him apologizing. Rei sighed. Salima deserved better than Kai, because she deserved someone who actually loved her.
"Just leave." He muttered before walking down the hall and slamming his door shut.
Leaning against his door he sighed. Certain things he had put away, like her shoes and her hairbrush. The things she had left behind, which hadn't been much had been put away. He had them out that first year. But when year two rolled around, he put them away, including that damn feather boa. He smirked then.
Rei gave him a strange stare. "What about this?" he asked as he held a pink feather boa. Rei watched in amazement as Kai's eyes widened slightly and his cheeks colored a slight barely visible pink.
Rei immediately threw him the boa, blushing himself. "Do I even want to know what you guys did with that?"
"No, you don't." Kai had told him with such a straight face while his cheeks became even redder. Rei simply nodded trying really hard not to laugh at Kai's embarrassment.
He locked his door and walked to his bed. Laying down he looked to his ceiling, plain white. He had spent one whole month cleaning the stupid glow-in-the-dark stars she had put there when she first moved in. She had spent so much time carefully crafting their constellations.
One year. He had spent one year looking for her, asking everyone who knew her, and in the end, there had been nothing. He was often upset when he found himself thinking about her or even thinking about thinking of her. She had left. She had taken her clothes and had walked out, leaving him and his words. He wanted to take them back. In the four years that had passed he had wanted to take them back.
Where was she now? He wondered that often. Perhaps she was happy, who knew. The only thing he knew was that he wanted her back. Rei had told him that he was not over her, had told him not to lead Salima on, that she was a nice girl. He had glared at him and yelled that he could care less about her, that he was not toying with Salima, was not using her to forget. But when he sat down to really think about it, something he often didn't do, he knew he was right. But his pride wouldn't allow him to admit it. Perhaps that had been the problem in the beginning, his pride and her pride.
Plato had been the only thing he had left and now…he closed his eyes as he sat up, his blood boiling. He was gone, lost somewhere in the city. He had been gone for two days and had trusted Salima. Putting up lost signs would be pointless he knew. If Plato wasn't dead already, then, some kid would probably have taken him and wouldn't want to return him. He scowled. Stupid kids. A knock to his door distracted him. He kept silent. Depending on who was bothering him, he would decide if he wanted to answer or not.
"Kai?" Rei's voice came muffled by the door. "Salima's gone. She says she's really sorry about Plato."
He opened his door and Rei merely gave him that look before handing him his book and walking away. "Mariah and I are going out to eat. Do you want us to bring you anything?"
"No." he answered before closing his door. Knowing Rei, he knew the picture was still in the book. He knew that picture by memory. Hiromi had dragged him to the arcade on the premise that it was her birthday and wasn't going to settle for just sex, plus there were no more condoms left.
His lips lifted into what could have been a smile. Setting the book down on his desk he smiled bitterly. He had taken for granted the idea that they would stay together. Look at where that had left him now.
Leaving his room and entering the kitchen he remembered vaguely that Rei mentioned something about more milk, juice, and eggs. Deciding that perhaps on his way to the store he might catch sight of that cat he left and wondered if he was a fool.
Hiromi had told him that he was, but that had been a long time ago, even before they began dating. That had been during the beginning of the care-free days, in the summer when he still laid down on the grass, when Max discovered that hat shop, and Hiromi used hair dye to color her hair red.
And when he saw her, picking out apples in the produce section he hesitated slightly. Five years was a long time and he wondered how on earth he had missed her. He was hesitant to approach her, battling his desire to scream or hug her… but when her shocked eyes met his, he didn't think anymore.
And the first thing that came out of her mouth when he approached her made him smile. "I found the cat."
.
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Original AN: This was originally going to be humor-ish but after listening to 'Dakota' by Stereophonics it ended up being rather angsty. I almost left it with them not meeting again. But I couldn't do it. Anyways hope you guys like this.
2018: this was also part of the 'Moments' one-shot collection. I won't be reposting that again, instead I'm just uploading a few of those oneshots.