Dedicated to Dolus, the wonderful writer (I am VERY horribly jealous...!) who gave me the definition of 'Still waters run deep' used in the second paragraph and helped me a lot with the ending.
Still Waters Run Deep
by Rb
Still waters run deep.
My mom used that phrase once, and when I asked her what it meant, she said it meant that things aren't always as simple and placid as they appear on the surface.
I've always thought that the phrase describes Iori perfectly. He's so much deeper than what he seems, it's scary.
He's so polite, addresses everyone by -san, it's almost eerie. Unnatural, for a boy of nine. He doesn't have many friends his own age, and he considers me his best human friend -- I'm not sure how that happened, we're nothing alike at all.
Me, I'm tall and awkward, my mouth moves like a stream of running water, from one thought to another, never staying still, never having the patience for anything other than computers. Iori, however, he's a lake that absorbs every scrap of water that comes, lapping gently against the shore but otherwise flat and calm. He's short and skinny -- concentrated, I once called him -- observing everything with his huge green eyes, oddly large in his small, pale face. He's a watcher, I'm a doer, and we get along very well.
He's better than a girlfriend, you know, the type that you go to the mall with and gossip to but can't trust with anything because she'll spill your words to ten other people as soon as you get home. Iori's nothing like that. He'll listen to what you say and take it in and lock it up behind a wall of steel and never, ever, tell a soul what you said, because he's too honest and decent to do anything like that.
Iori knows everything about me, from the superficial things to the deepest parts of my soul. He knows that I can't stand sushi and I wish my hair was wavy instead of stickly-straight and how I hate how awkward I am and how being tall stinks when I'm such a klutz, and how I wish I did better in school, and how I felt about all of the crushes I've had. He knows how I believe that Mimi and Koushirou are my idols -- Mimi because she's so pretty and so sweet and kind towards everyone, and Koushirou because he's so brilliant, a thousand times better than I'll ever be at school and computers, and how I secretly envy both of them. He knows how much I complain about my parents and he's helped me study for a thousand and one tests. He knows that I think of him as the little brother I've always wanted.
But, on the flip side, I know next to nothing about Iori. I know how his green eyes always seem shadowed and always have a grim side to them, even when he lets me see one of his rare smiles. I can interpret the expression on his face...sometimes. I know he studies kendo, he beat someone in the high school last year. I know he does well in school without even trying, always at the top of his class. (Of course, he knows all of my texts by heart!) I know he hates deep water because he was on a plane crash when he was little and landed in the ocean. I know his father died in the line of duty when he was younger, but I don't know what line of duty it was. I know his death must have hurt Iori deeply, because half of what makes Iori so much Iori is that his father's death shook him at such a young age, he's very set in his ways and does rituals, sometimes, that don't make sense to anyone else. I know that Iori prefers classical music to pop, how strange!
I know that Iori's got so many layers to him, I can't even hope of reaching the innermost parts of him, even if I know him for a million years. Maybe Armadimon knows him well enough to pierce through those layers, I don't know.
He's so honest and faithful, punctual, it's unnatural, really, I don't know another soul like him. He's so unique, he seems almost ancient, like he's an old man stuck in a younger body. He's mature beyond his years.
But who is Hida Iori?
I wish I knew him better. I wish he'd let me know him. But he's untouchable. He shuts out everyone equally.
Only a few times can I get a glimpse of the real Iori, through a tiny chink in his armor. These glimpses are fleeting, though, and just as quickly as they appear, they're gone, and I wonder if I had ever seen anything at all of the inner Iori. I know him better than anyone else, I think - but all that means is that I can see he's far more than he ever lets on...
Iori-kun, let me into your heart someday...!