Time's Up
Time works in the strangest ways. One moment, it could be hell for you, but the next, it could be heaven. It separates, yet brings together. Whether it is good, though... Remains unspoken of.
"I want to die," he whispered to the darkness, as he lay on the hospital bed.
He wanted to reach out, to pull out the wires attached to him, to be able to just cut off his life, to simply let death consume him whole so that he wouldn't need to suffer in this bleak, ugly world.
He reached out, hands trembling, and grasped the wires of the machine... Would his time be up? Would his weary life come to an end? Would his never-ending suffering stop forever?
But he was scared.
That was when something appeared by his window, sliding it open with a soft creak. It sat down on the windowsill calmly, its large wings poking out of the window.
"Are you death? Have you come to take me away?" Tsunayoshi whispered, and the creature scoffed.
"Do all humans want to die so badly?" it said, and presently lit a flame out of his palm, illuminating the room dimly.
"No, it's just me," Tsunayoshi whispered. "Just me..."
"Foolish," it replied, laughing mockingly. "Humans are all foolish herbivores."
Tsunayoshi didn't reply. He could hear the fire burning his house, tongues of flames licking it away, leaving behind ashes of his past. He stayed silent as fresh tears rolled down his face, simply gripping the bed sheets tightly as he shut his eyes and let the tears roll down. He had let everyone down. His friends, his mother, his pet cat Natsu...
They were all burnt alive, but there he was, still alive and breathing.
"Kill me, death," he whispered to the winged creature, but it didn't.
"I am not this death you speak of, herbivore," he replied blandly, his wings flapping slowly and restlessly.
"Then you must be an angel," Tsunayoshi whispered desperately. "Can you kill me?"
"It is not time for you, foolish one. I am simply here to guard you and protect you," the creature explained as patiently as he could. 'What a waste of time,' it thought. 'I could be killing foolish herbivores who deserve to be dead.'
"No, no, no! You're here to kill me, so kill me now! Kill me! I don't want to live!" the boy screamed hysterically, before curling up into his bed sheets and sobbing.
"Shut up, herbivore," the other commanded calmly, before his wings disappeared and he entered the room fully. "You're making a ruckus. Shut up or I'll bite you to death."
Tsunayoshi looked up, suddenly smiling. "Bite me to death? I'll die?"
The angel sighed. What a twisted herbivore this kid was, crying and screaming in one minute, and smiling in the next.
"No," it replied, pushing the crazed boy to the side so it could crawl into the bed. It laid down next to the human boy who was half crying, half smiling, and pulled him closer. "I meant this."
The angel bent down and bit down hard onto the humans neck, tasting the salty, red liquid that trailed out. Tsunayoshi squirmed a little, but didn't do anything.
"Can I know your name, angel?" he asked timidly, but the angel simply ignored him and continued licking his neck.
"Not now, herbivore," it growled. "Someday, when you're not a herbivore anymore."
"Alright."
That was how their first meeting went. 'It's weird,' the angel thinks. Never once in his time had he ever met such a strange human who wanted to die despite being so young. Maybe that was why it was so attracted to this particular herbivore. How foolish...
But it held Tsunayoshi close and lulled him to sleep.
Nights went by quickly, but mornings dragged far and long. It was three days since Tsunayoshi first met the black-winged angel that he was convinced would kill him eventually when his time was up. He just wasn't sure when.
It was a bleak December morning, and the streets were cold and white with snow. Tsunayoshi wasn't allowed to go out, but he could see it all from his window - people laughing, cars driving by, the snowflakes falling down one by one...
It made his throat dry, and all he wanted was to die.
'Die, die, die, die, die,' his thoughts screamed. 'You caused Gokudera's death, Yamamoto's misery, your mother's pain and you cat's poor life. You're a horrible, horrible little bastard that deserves to die and rot in hell, not just sitting here with burns and bruises and a breathing lung. Where's the angel? Call him! Call him! You need to die!'
Tsunayoshi screamed hysterically as he clutched his head, wishing to drop dead, to get everything to stop, to shut his mind down and just black out so he wouldn't have to breathe again, or suffer another minute, or dream about Gokudera or Yamamoto or his mother or Natsu getting burnt alive while he was still here, breathing and living.
It hurt.
It didn't take long for a few nurses to burst into the room, ready to help despite knowing that they were useless in such a situation. It was their job, after all, to act like they cared and smile brightly.
Tsunayoshi thrashed wildly, and for once, the nurses were scared. The boy's burns were barely healing, but he was making it worst by moving around and refusing to get better.
"Angel! I want the angel!" he screamed, but no one understood, and no one tried to help. It wasn't until the doctors sedated him that the boy fell into deep sleep.
"The boy needs to be placed in the asylum once he heals," one of the nurses joked, but the angel seated on the couch behind him with a newspaper in hand didn't think it was funny.
It was going to heal the boy.
It was a week since Tsunayoshi first met the angel, and ten days since he sent to the hospital.
It was there, lying next to him, stroking his hair and murmuring honey-coated words of comfort and assurance while he snuggled against its chest, inhaling the sweet vanilla scent that seemed to twist and turn his brain into goo and make him feel safe.
"Angel?" he whispered. "Can you tell me something?"
"What do you want to know?" it replied softly, its breath tickling Tsunayoshi's ears.
Tsunayoshi paused for a moment. What did he want to know? When he would die? Why the angel was here every night at eleven without fail? Whether he was insane?
"Am I going insane?" the boy whispered, his voice cracking in the middle of the sentence.
He wished he hadn't asked such a stupid question, but he needed assurance and lies to make him feel better. Tsunayoshi knew better, he knew the difference in characters when he was with the angel and when he was alone in the daytime, he knew the insanity was going to eat him bit by bit and never let him die, he knew he was going to lose the battle for sanity, he knew he wanted to die, but being with the angel made him feel alive again.
"No, you are not," the angel replied back, pulling the boy closer to him. "You are not."
"Really?" Tsunayoshi whispered, half wanting to believe the black-winged creature, but the other half of his mind screamed at him and laughed mockingly.
"Yes," the angel replied blandly. "Don't be a herbivore."
Tsunayoshi teared up, but half smiled as he snuggled up to the angel.
It was ten in the morning when Tsunayoshi awoke the next day, and after the doctor came to check up on him, he requested for permission to go outside.
Of course, he was pushed in a wheelchair by a nurse, but it was better than nothing. There was no source of entertainment in the intensive care unit, and Tsunayoshi had no friends who wanted to visit him, apart from Enma who visited thrice, but well, at least he made an effort to. The boy in the wheelchair was hoping that he would be transferred to a normal ward soon, though.
Then, there came the worry of having to pay for the bills.
Obviously, his house was burnt down mysteriously one night, and only he survived. He didn't know how much money there was in his mother's bank account, but Tsunayoshi pushed that thought to the back of his mind as the nurse, a certain Chrome Dokuro, pushed the wheelchair slowly into the garden that the hospital kept for patients to exercise or relax.
The breeze felt foreign against his skin, and the air was sweet. The sunshine casted a soft shadow of everything around as Chrome continued to wheel him around the garden slowly, half afraid that the boy would get into one of his moods. He hadn't gotten into any bad mood lately, and he was a nice and friendly patient when he wanted to be. It was just as if... Her patient was being healed by god...
'Absurd,' the angel sitting on the roof thought, but was satisfied with his human's progress.
"You know, you've been a really good boy lately," the angel whispered into Tsunayoshi's ears one night when they cuddled against each other as usual.
Tsunayoshi basked in happiness.
He was still in the hospital two weeks later, but Tsunayoshi didn't mind. He didn't mind, because he knew the black-winged angel would come to visit him, and this angel made him feel special and happy, as if his troubles melted away and disappeared. He knew it wasn't possible, but he didn't care anymore. The angel was his reason for living, his drive to live on, his special one that he didn't want to lose.
"Can I know your name now?" Tsunayoshi asked the following night, and the angel sighed.
"Is it really that important for you to know?"
Tsunayoshi nodded, looking up at the black-winged creature earnestly, and it sighed again.
"I'm Hibari Kyoya."
"Hibari-san is really beautiful," Tsunayoshi mumbled, and Hibari scoffed.
"I'm a male, if you haven't noticed," he said, but he was secretly happy about the compliment.
Hibari didn't return that night.
It was eleven-thirty, and Tsunayoshi was bawling his eyes out. Was Hibari going to leave him? Was it over? Would he ever see the angel again?
It wasn't until midnight that Hibari slid the window open and jumped in, and Tsunayoshi cried harder and flung his arms around said angel, who returned the hug.
"I thought you weren't going to return, Kyoya," Tsunayoshi cried as he tightened his hold and sobbed against the angel's chest. "I thought I was going to be alone tonight."
What Tsunayoshi didn't notice, though, was how Hibari hugged him back tightly and murmured apologies.
Just like that, the next day, Hibari was gone, leaving behind only a short letter with a few sentences.
"Live life to the fullest, Tsunayoshi. My time with you is up, but you will stay in my heart forever."
- Hibari Kyoya
"Time's up," Tsunayoshi whispered, but for once, he was fine with being alone.