Title: Now we are both incomplete
Characters/Pairings: Chrome-centric, Tsuna, Kyouko
Rating: G
Word Count: 1500
Warnings: spoilers for chapter 349, introspective
Disclaimer: Standard disclaimers apply.
Prompt/Theme: Dec 21 "she fears she won't be followed" at 31_days
Notes: Written in April 2011. Title taken from Sylvia Plath's poem "Where it was at back then"
Children's laughter has faded from the place it occupied not too long ago, it echoes now through the sick melody of creaking metal. Off to her right side street lamps lit in gloomy patches and she watches their faint glow ghost over the reflecting hinges.
It's quiet here, not a classroom silence, but a muted hum coming from the main streets; there's a shout now and then, laughter, a car horn, but it's still enough to focus on the playgrounds in her head, focus and reach out.
There's some eerie overtone as well. Something that should be there, but isn't. Maybe it's too quiet after all.
The day before, she found their shelter emptied of life safe for her own and that of moths and mice. Found her mind emptied too of his touch, that gentle brush like a protective veil that bars every leeching bug or thought from entering, that presence of his senses that assured her he was still alive somewhere.
She feels hollow, as though something has been scooped out of her. She clutches at her breast, where a fist threatens to crush the boiled egg of her heart, an egg that's neither hard enough to defy shaping nor soft enough to slump from oval shape to goo. At least she knows it's still there.
Her heart still sits in its usual throne, or its outline does.
She's exhausted, a candle stub burning out for the night. She approaches the swing that glints in the dim glow of the gloomy street lights as though offering her a wink and a smile. She coughs.
As she sets foot on the playground, boot sinking into the soil, she finally pieces together the absence she's been feeling all day since yesterday.
They're not here. Not around.
Like with ghosts wafting from dreams to illusions in the real world, she has become so used to feeling eyes on her; nothing malicious and no stalkers exactly. Protectors, rather, looking out for her as their only thread to what's most important to them.
They used to follow her at a distance, out of sight, either one of them or both, shaded by shop signs or the leaves of trees. She imagined they looked after her, because they worried - about him more than her, no doubt - although they showed no signs back their shelter and so she decided not to let them know she knows they follow. She might hurt their pride; these boys could be prickly. Or maybe they think she doesn't require their usual stealth.
Either way, they've been there since the first day, since she's been reborn as Chrome, closed the door to her old life and opened her arms to her new one, and them. They used to say they didn't like her; they took some getting used to her. And who could blame them? Following the old screams and the stench of memory, it's a surprise they allowed her to live under the same roof with them.
Sharing their space.
It could have been an order. It could have been more.
They used to be soft on her; some might call it cold, the turned heads and cordial distance. But, oh no, Ken was not like that. He was a landmine you needn't step upon, his temper a bonfire in the night, flaring high. Yet even his rages seemed not as harsh as they could be.
On some days, she could glean his mood from the intensity of his stare: bundled like a target laser, it almost burned at her neck. With Chikusa though, she could never tell; his gaze was always steady, a liquid surface undisturbed by tremors. Or so it seemed.
So now she's cold. Seat creaking beneath her, she shivers into the night. She coughs now and then.
Away from their shelter, deprived of their watchful gazes, she feels exposed. And ill. Not exactly vulnerable though, she doesn't know what that feels like anymore. Susceptible to being hurt.
Her egg-like heart quivers on its throne; it could hold no more pain.
(But she's not sad anymore, Boss and his friends made sure of that.)
It would seem that Mukuro does not need her anymore, now that he is free. He does not need her body anymore, does not need to borrow it, his link to the flesh. He walks on his own feet now and she is glad.
His note, however, worried her. The tone was too harsh, the imperative too sharp for his usual self. The fist squeezed her heart at the thought of it.
Here she sits now, in a Namimori uniform and Kokuyo boots, a part of both. Or does she no longer belong to Kokuyo, now that she attends Namimori? (It's the school Boss and his friends attend, so has she been shoved off to the Vongola for good this time?) You cannot have everything, some would say. But she doesn't want everything. She wants to be a part of both, that's all. It's not impossible, or hasn't been. Until now.
It doesn't end here, she doesn't think so. She believes Mukuro has something to tell her, but he doesn't use her dreams, the bridges of their minds.
She rules out the possibilities, plucks them off like petals from a rose. This life is not too dangerous for her, he couldn't think so now. They both knew from the start. Promises made and meant to be kept. If it were a test, she would know the conditions. You shall be visited by a man who explains the rules; they're all written down.
If he wanted her to live a normal life now, without him and her memories of their time together, he had not considered her own feelings first. He would know what she wanted, he has known all along, it was not a secret.
As she sits on the creaking seat of the swing, Kokuyo boots off the ground so she sways a little, shivering into the night, the fist inside her chest clenching and unclenching at intervals, mourning the absence of watchful eyes and the protective veil around her mind, and wondering about reasons she has yet to uncover, she didn't notice two figures approaching.
Her tiny heart battles against its steel-boned confines for a short breath.
"Chrome?" It's Boss's voice that's calling. She should have known that they would come looking for her. She should have known, but this is still so new to her, going home to a family that can only be considered yours by tragic extension, and living off the goodwill of others.
"Boss?" At her reaction, the person with him claps her hands together and beams, her own glow shooing the gloom away. "And Kyouko?"
"Thank goodness that we found you," Kyouko says. Good-natured as always, she really means it.
"What are you doing here? I mean, it's late and we have been searching all over for you and i-it's okay if you don't want to talk about it, we were all just so worried when we didn't see you after school and didn't know where you were going or when you'd be back; and when you didn't come back although it's so late, big Brother called me, because he thought I knew where you were, but when I didn't we all went out looking for you - Lambo and I-pin, too - and now that you're here we should probably let them know and -"
"I'm sorry," Chrome says.
"Huh?" Boss's train of thought stumbles over Chrome's interjection, after it has been trying to catch up with the words tumbling from his mouth, correcting and explaining and trying hard not to make it sound like an accusation. Because it's not.
"I'm sorry I made you worry." She states simply. They don't need flourishes of big explanations or excuses.
"No, i-it's okay. I mean, you're safe and all." Boss tries to appease, as usual, where no appeasement is necessary.
"Let's go home," Kyouko says, concern lacing the edge of her voice. "You'll catch a cold."
The swing beneath her mewls one last time as she gets up, before it oscillates with cold creaking metal laughter. What she faces now is another night of superficial happiness, a glaze of sugary sweet family life she would otherwise never have come to experience.
It's not as though she's not grateful for it, she's happy, really, as happy as you can be with your heart captive to relentless pressure, your protective veil stripped off and your loyal watchmen gone. It's just that she wants to be able to enjoy it fully, with the knowledge that Mukuro is alive out there somewhere. Or better yet, alive and by her side.
Yes, that's what she wants: to bring the two opposing parts together, let them enjoy each other's company without bloodshed or complaints. She'd really like to share this special kind of closeness with Mukuro and Chikusa and Ken, although she know it's not their kind of life and will never be.
She can almost hear the chuckles and the roars, see the frosty stare. She knows it's not possible.
Still, a girl can dream.