Disclaimer: If wishes were horses, Eiji would have a mane and Fuji would have hooves. Alas, I own no creatures with manes or hooves.

A/N: I'm not so good at finishing long fics, my record being something like 15 started, none posted. I'm hoping that if I write this chapter by chapter it will go better. There may be some time gaps in between chappies though. By the way, this is dedicated to my Kat who I have neglected recently, but who will always be my inspiration. She doesn't even read this fandom! Crazy fanfic people. :shakes head:

Too Real to Be Heaven

Fuji met Eiji during his 6th year of school. It was just a regular first week of school, plenty of paperwork and introductions. Things the other students found fun because they didn't have to do work, but just bored Fuji to death. A transfer at that time of the year was a bit strange. If the school year had just begun, then why hadn't the kid just started off with everyone else three days ago?

When the new guy walked in, the first thing Fuji's eyes went to was his hair. Everyone's eyes went there. Light hair wasn't at all common in Japan and red hair was downright rare, even in other countries. That and the blue eyes made him an automatic oddity. His introduction was just about as enthusiastic as any other kid's though, so soon he was forgotten in favor of staring out the window (at least in Fuji's case).

That day at lunch Fuji went to sit out under the maple trees to eat as usual. It wasn't like he was antisocial, he just liked his alone time more than the other kids seemed to. It was quite peaceful until he heard a thud next to him. He cracked his eyes open a bit from where he was dozing and saw the new kid. He seemed to be taking a nap and Fuji had to check on him to make sure he hadn't actually fainted. Once he was satisfied though, he decided to just ignore the guy. It might be a tad bit more crowded, but his tree was still peaceful.

Things continued on that way for the rest of that week and on into the second, the boy joining Fuji silently under his tree for lunch, before a change occurred. That Tuesday wasn't any different. It had the sunny early autumn warmth that was so enjoyable and other than a test in math, it was business as usual. But for some reason that day the new guy came into class and well… "Hiya everybody, nya!" He bounced, literally bounced, across the room.

Since Fuji sat right across the aisle from Kikumaru-kun, he was able to observe this abrupt change of personality. Where the redhead had been rather quiet and self-contained since he had arrived, now he was chatting animatedly with both the boy who sat in front of him and the girl who was usually trying to hide her fashion magazine from the teacher in the seat ahead of Fuji. The two were laughing and seemed charmed by the redhead. Who knew he had it in him?

Fuji decided to stop tuning them out, his interest having been stirred. "Nya, so there I was under the tree trying to get Neko-kun down. He didn't want to come at all. He was so scared he wouldn't move! I thought it was okay to leave for a sec and get a ladder from a nearby house. I met the couple when I was at the park before." Fuji's two classmates seemed totally engrossed in the story. It wasn't so much the content, but the way Kikumaru-kun told it. All bright eyes and waving hands and waggling eyebrows.

"Then I got up to the branch where Neko-kun was. I was just about to grab him when, wouldn't you know it, Risu-san decided to jump on my head! He startled me and I hit the ladder and it fell!" This brought a gasp from his audience which had somehow swelled to 5 besides the covertly listening Fuji. Kikumaru-kun nodded his head with wide eyes, apparently agreeing with their assessment of his past predicament. It was such a child-like action.

"How did you not fall and get hurt Kikumaru-kun?" one of his original listeners asked in something akin to awe. "Hoi! I grabbed onto the tree limb. I didn't really mean to, but it was a reflex. Neko-kun wasn't as scared as he looked, though, 'cause he swiped my face with his claws, then he chased after Risu-san and ran right down the tree! He left me stuck up there!" He pouted indignantly and several people chuckled. He flashed them a brilliant grin.

"But that doesn't tell us how you got down." The same girl unknowingly played her part as catalyst for the redhead's storytelling. "Well-" At that inopportune moment the bell to begin classes rang. The people gathered in Fuji's corner of the room held expressions ranged from irritation to dismay. They knew they would get in trouble if they remained, though, so with much grumbling, all returned to their seats.

Fuji occupied himself during class with watching his unpredictable neighbor. Besides taking notes of course. Of course. One second he would be tapping his pencil against his leg, the next he would be curling a lock of his bright hair around his fingers, and the next he seemed to be playing some unintelligible game with a sheet of paper. The boy couldn't sit still at all. This was a 180 degree turn from the youth who had sat unmoving and stared at the teacher for the past few weeks.

When the bell for class change rang and their teacher dismissed them, the desk beside Fuji's was immediately surrounded. No one was about to give Kikumaru-kun a chance to get away without finishing his tale. The redhead didn't seem to mind in the least.

"As I was saying before I was rudely interrupted!" He sent a mock glare at the device on the wall that conveyed the bell's sound. This elicited a laugh from everyone and even Fuji's ever-present smile widened. "I managed to pull myself up onto the branch so I could sit instead of hanging off. But there weren't branches close enough to the ground for me to climb down." "If there were, you wouldn't have needed the ladder in the first place, ne?" Rather than being irritated at the interruption, Kikumaru-kun took it in good stride. "Hoi Hoi! That's right. Kikumaru-sama can climb anything that can be climbed and some that can't." Several people sweatdropped at his confidence.

"I sat up on that branch for three hours! It was getting dark when the couple I borrowed the ladder from came out to see why I hadn't returned it yet. They held the ladder for me when I came down, but they laughed at me and Obaasan hit me on the head with a rolled up newspaper. She said that a silly human neko-chan shouldn't climb a tree anymore than a silly neko Neko-kun." Fuji rather thought that Obaasan had a point.

"So the neko's scratch is why you have that bandage on your face?" Was that what that story had started as, an explanation of the plaster on the redhead's nose? "Yup!" Kikumaru-kun happily chirped. The bell rang again and the students dispersed as their next teacher entered. Fuji continued to watch the mysteriously cheerful boy from his convenient vantage point. Had he not, he wouldn't have noticed the slight dimming of the redhead's face.

For just a short second there was a hint of sorrow in the blue eyes and a tightness about his mouth, but it passed like the shadow of a cloud across the land. It took less time for the seemingly habitual brightness to return than it did for their teacher to make her way to the front of the class. "Saa, I wonder…"

Later that day Fuji sat underneath his usual tree. For the first time since the third day of school, he spent the whole of the lunch period alone in his sanctuary. He had assumed that Kikumaru-kun's sudden change in personality would earn him several new seating options among his peers, so the tensai was not surprised at all. Maybe he felt the tiniest breath of loneliness, but not enough to really bother with. At least this new Kikumaru-kun was entertaining.

There was one final intriguing event that day. During their Physical Education period, they were finally beginning their outdoors sports. Today the whole class was split by gender and they lined up for their turn to vault over a horse. Many were displeased by this turn of events. "You know, sitting in a classroom and learning about muscles and respiration isn't exactly fun, but it's better than this!" "Yeah. It's going to be torture tonight with all the bruises I'm going to get!" "I don't know, I think respiration is pretty interesting."

The last speaker was taller than most and sported spiky hair and glasses that reflected the light so that it obscured his eyes. He held a small notepad in his hand. Fuji wouldn't have noticed him if he hadn't been standing right behind the boy in line.

Fuji turned his attention back to the horse and was just in time to see yet another person crash into the front instead of going over. He hadn't been able to put enough power into his leap to clear the top. He scrambled away as quickly as he could, his face bright red. The next person bounced on the balls of his feet as he waited for the coach's go ahead. When it was given, a blur with red hair rushed towards the cursed horse and planted his hands solidly on the top of it. He leaped cleanly over it, opening his legs to the side to avoid bumping and landed perfectly.

The whole class gaped with open jaws at the boy who was now turning to each side and giving the traditional salute. He was definitely a performer, this one. For not only had he managed to get over the horse, but there had been at least 6 inches of air between him and the obstacle. Some people inevitably made it over, but not like that. Someone started clapping and soon everyone was doing it.

"Way to go Kikumaru-kun!" "That was sugoi!" The redhead returned to his classmates, rubbing his hand behind his neck in pleased embarrassment. He would never be able to hide it anyway with the way his skin flushed as red as a tomato. The curse of red hair Fuji supposed.

The coach barked for the next victim… ahem, student to come forward and soon all was back to business. The spiky-haired boy in front of Fuji made it over the horse in a more normal manner, stumbling a bit on his landing. Fuji now awaited his own signal to begin his run. When it was given he ran forward and sailed gracefully over, landing with as much grace as he did everything else.

His performance gained a little response, but not nearly as much as Kikumaru-kun's had. It was much less extravagant than the redhead's display and Fuji had been to primary school with some of these students, so they already knew of his abilities. Fuji didn't crave attention, so it didn't bother him at all. He was too involved with his curiosity right then to even notice anyway.

Kikumaru-kun had enough potential to be a real gymnast. The energy he seemed to be filled with had an outlet besides drawing in every person he met after all. The thought hadn't occurred to Fuji, but it fit so well that he was extremely pleased with it. His smile widened infinitesimally.

The youth awoke in a strangely familiar place. The air around him seemed to be obscured by a gentle fog that he didn't exactly recognize, but it was achingly familiar nonetheless. He got to his feet, his hand brushing the lush green grass as he did. A park maybe?

Looking around him, he couldn't seem to see anything through the fog. It was like a wall, completely opaque whiteness. How strange. Wasn't fog supposed to have tendrils? Well, he couldn't just stand there forever when he didn't even have a clue where he was or how he had gotten there, could he? It didn't really seem to matter which way he went, so he headed off in the direction he had ended up facing when he stood.

The fog seemed to dampen everything, literally and figuratively. Even time was subdued and far away. He passed nothing else as he walked. No other objects at all, not even trees. It could have been mere minutes that he wandered or over an hour. There was no way to tell. Somewhere along the way, though, it had gotten a bit brighter. The fog that had seemed so solid before started to separate into the shape that he thought it should have been in all along. He stepped out of the final strands of fog, into a meadow. It wasn't perfectly circular and the patches of flowers that he could see were mostly blooms from weeds, but it was still a lovely little place. It might have even been the flaws that made it so.

A glare caught his eye and he turned to look. He peered around and saw it again, realizing that something in the grass was reflecting the sun's bright rays back at him. He strode over to the place, eager to see. When he got close he saw that it was a clear pool of still water. It was so deep that he couldn't see the bottom despite the clarity.

Surprisingly, there was another youth kneeling there when he arrived. He hadn't seen anyone else before, but maybe the grass had hidden…? It really shouldn't have been high enough though. The other boy looked up at him with sharp eyes, but not an unkind expression. "I've been waiting for you."

That startled him. He didn't know this person. Why would he be waiting for him? "I hope I haven't kept you." he replied politely. His mother had always taught him to be polite no matter if he was running from a stampede of monkeys or having tea at a friend's.

The other boy didn't reply, but his lips quirked upwards a bit at the corners and he gestured for him to sit down. "Not really. Don't worry about it." His voice had a strange duality to it, at once sounding like a boy's, but also with the deep undertones of a man's.

They sat there for a while just enjoying the warmth of the sun on their backs and the light breeze through their hair. It really should have been awkward, but a strange understanding had popped up between them almost instantly. It was quite enjoyable. With the meadow and his companion the boy felt that this was close to heaven.

He sighed ruefully. What a silly thought! This was just another meadow, like several he had seen when his Otousan had taken him hiking. It was too real to be heaven.

Finally the silence was broken. "Look." the other boy said quietly and pointed towards the middle of the pool. The other boy's voice took on yet another dimension as it seemed to hold an authority that would be extremely hard to deny. He did as he was told and peered into the surface of the water. He still couldn't see the bottom, but a picture began to form slowly. This reminded him of the stories his Obaasan used to tell him about folk magic.

Tiny bits of color that belonged in the water swirled endlessly together until new colors emerged that couldn't have ever possibly been there naturally. Finally the image was clear. In it was a classroom full of middle school students. The boy was intrigued. Why would the strange pool be showing him this? The angle changed as the picture zoomed in on a pair of boys sitting in the back of the room. As the boy studied the tableau, he noticed that one of the youths in the picture had red hair. Red…?

Memories started to rush into his head, flashing by as the image in the pool spread out around him and all of a sudden he could hear. He was a hovering observer with an eagle's eye view of the room now and he could hear and see everything as if he were really there. Students' shirts rustled as they shifted in their seats and somewhere someone was tapping a pencil softly. It felt as if all of the vibrant things around him were real, and it was he that was not. It was hard to really focus on these things, though, when he only had eyes for one occupant of the room. Now he knew why he was here.

His heart was aching sharply, almost too much for him to bear alone. His eyes burned, but the tears didn't seem to want to slip out. His world was ending and he couldn't even cry? Why?! How could things have happened this way? He screamed in rage and pain and sorrow, but the sound was too thin and faint.

It was too much. His strange form, defined but insubstantial, curled in on itself. No one else in the room noticed him. Those who should have cared, couldn't. He felt like his insides were being ripped apart.

But suddenly, there was another strange form beside him and a strong hand slipped into his own. The boy from the meadow looked at him with eyes that said that they understood. It was not empathy, but sympathy. This other boy had felt the same once, maybe was feeling it even now, for the boy was not sure this feeling could ever completely leave him again. There would always be a pain there. Always a crack in his heart ready to split the whole thing apart given a chance. But with a hand in his, he could straighten his back and face it at least. With this hand in his, maybe he could face this pain.

For those of you who were confused why someone named Risu-san came out of nowhere to jump on Eiji's head, Risu is the Japanese word for squirrel. So it's basically Mr. Cat and Mr. Squirrel. Sounds so much better in another language, ne?

As for the part about the youth, you aren't supposed to necessarily get it right away. I'm trying NOT to give EVERYTHING away too early. If you're confused, then I'm actually pleased. I'm sorry if it's a bit obscure, but the only thing I can advise is to go back and read it after I reveal what was happening. That's the strategy I use when I read someone else's writing. XD

A/N: That's the first installment. Review or I will call forth a bolt of lightning to strike you with. Love ya!