Disclaimer: I don't own Fushigi Yuugi... but, you probably knew that,
right? ^_~
Author's Notes: This is a very different reincarnation fic. It does not center around everyone finding each other and getting their memories back. In fact.. most of the seishi only make minute appearances in this... and it may only be that they remember that they were once part of something else.. I haven't decided yet. But... there will be a lot of shounen ai in this.. so if you don't like shounen ai... don't flame me.. I gave my warning. ^__^
~~~~
The young man worked diligently in front of the window. His fingers and hands were scratched and bleeding, but he barely noticed. Instead, his eyes never wavered from the masterpiece he was creating before him. The colors of red and white and green blended and blurred together, then settled into a beautiful arrangement.
"One last thing... there." The man sighed, sat back, and gazed critically at the work of art that sat on the table in front of him. He reached out and pushed a few pieces in place, then sat back again. A grin broke out on his face, then. "Perfect."
The ringing of the bell above the door to the shop sounded, so he stood and turned. "Hi," he greeted.
A woman of nearly sixty regarded him with a gentle smile. "Hello there, young man. I'm looking for Ryuuen."
"Well, you found him."
One of the woman's well-shaped eyebrows rose in question. "You're Ryuuen Chou? The fabulous flower arranger?"
Ryuuen smiled. "I wouldn't say fabulous, but yeah, that's me. How can I help you?" He held out his hand, and the woman shook it.
"I must say," she told him, laughing a bit nervously. "You look awfully young to have a lot of experience in flower arranging."
The young man sighed. Why did people always say that? He was twenty-one, old enough to drink, drive, be married, and have kids... yet not old enough to be a decent flower arranger. He pushed his purple bangs off his forehead with the back of his hand, realized there was blood all over it. "Umm," he said. "Have a look around. Everything on that side of the shop was done by me. I'll be right out."
The woman nodded, looked around.
Ryuuen walked into the small bathroom behind the counter. As he washed his hands, he saw a few rather deep cuts. "Damn roses," he muttered. "So beautiful, but so damned painful." He dried his hands, made sure he wasn't bleeding anymore. Before he walked out of the bathroom, he looked into the mirror.
He had always liked the way he looked. He was slender, if not too thin, and shorter than most guys liked to be. He kept his violet colored hair short, with the bangs longer in the front. He had a heart-shaped face, with dark purple eyes. The eyes always got people's attention. The smooth, pale skin of his face was flawless, marked only by a beauty mark right below his left eye.
Ryuuen shook his head. He had customers, even if they doubted they talent. He walked back out to the shop, saw the woman admiring an arrangement of yellow Irises.
"Now, ma'am. Is there anything in particular you're looking for?"
She turned when she heard his voice. "Yes, actually. I'm looking for something to give my next door neighbor. She just returned from the hospital today from suffering a near-fatal heart attack."
Ryuuen offered his apologies with a nod. "Is there a specific flower she likes?"
"Oh yes. Rose loves lilies."
"Lilies... lilies..." Ryuuen gazed around the shop, finger resting on his chin in thought. "Oh! Here." He led her over the far right wall, where a series of flowers were sitting in vases.
"I have a fairly wide variety of lilies. Did you want to do all one kind?"
The woman turned to him. "You know, Ryuuen. I hardly know. What would you suggest?"
The purple-haired man smiled. He loved it when people did that. "Well... if she just got home from the hospital, something a bit colorful would be great. Everything in hospitals is white, so I think some color would really brighten Rose's mood. We have a light pink lily.... here." He reached up and pulled a pink flower from one of the high vases. "And..." He grabbed another flower from a different vase. "This blue one I think is absolutely gorgeous."
"Oh, it is. I like that."
"I could do a pretty simple, yet elegant arrangement using these two varieties, if you'd like."
The woman smiled. "I think that would be perfect. Uh, how long will it take?"
"I can do it right now, if you'd like to stay and watch."
The old lady's face lit up. "Truly? I would love to watch you work."
As Ryuuen sat down at the table he used to work, the lady stood off to the side, fascination showing on her face. He first picked out a vase – a white ceramic one with a blue vine running around it that matched the blue lilies – the started placing the flowers in it. He alternated blue and pink lilies until the vase was full, then added some wisps of blue baby's breath. As he worked, the woman watched on. She noticed the rose arrangement still sitting there.
"Wow," she gushed.
"Eh?"
"That rose arrangement is beautiful."
"Thank you," Ryuuen said. "I'm pretty proud of that one. This guy is getting for his wife. It's their one year wedding anniversary."
"If he gets her gifts like that all the time, she'll never leave him," the woman remarked.
Ryuuen smiled. He put the finishing touch on the lilies... a pink bow around the neck of the vase and sat back so the woman could see it.
"Aaaaah," she placed a hand over her mouth. "It's amazing," she said, a few tears filling her eyes. "Rose will love that."
"I think it will really brighten her day and put a smile on her face," Ryuuen said, moving behind the counter to ring the woman up.
She gave him a big tip before she left. "Thank you so very much, Ryuuen. I'll be sure to come back here any time I need flowers."
Ryuuen nodded. "You have yourself a wonderful day, ma'am."
After the woman had left, Ryuuen made a phone call to the man who had ordered the roses. "Myojuan? Hello, it's Ryuuen. The roses are done, sir. Sure, I'll be expecting you then."
He hung up the phone and looked at his watch. Myojuan would be there in an hour. Ryuuen frowned. It was 4 o'clock. Kishuku was always at the shop by now... so where was he?
The door opened, and Ryuuen looked up. A man with blue hair and haunted eyes had walked in. "Kishuku! Where have you been?"
Kishuku smiled weakly. "My dad's in the hospital again, Ryuuen. I've been there since last night."
Ryuuen ran around the counter and gave his friend a tight hug. "Why didn't you call me? I could have come and waited with you."
"Thanks... Saihitei was with me last night."
"Saihitei? Who's that?"
Kishuku grinned down at his friend. "He's the guy who's family is rich. I told you about him. I worked at his house doing gardening work last summer."
"Oh, that's right. I remember now."
Ryuuen's best friend looked at the shop with a frown. "Hasn't Mrs. Leary let you paint this place yet?"
"No... She's still thinking about it. I talked to her on Thursday, and she didn't seem to happy about painting her building." The walls of the flower shop were cracked... the paint was beginning to peel off in places. All in all, the place was a mess.
"How you long you had this place open, Ryuuen?"
Ryuuen blinked at Kishuku's question. "Three years, why?"
He shrugged. "I just thought maybe Mrs. Leary would realize that in three years, a place would need paint. God, you pay her enough for rent."
"Kisukuuu..." Ryuuen said warningly. "My rent is fine. I make enough here to afford this place and my utilities and still be able to pay my car payments and insurance and then some."
"Okay, okay," he sighed. "I'm just tired."
"Why don't you go home and get some rest. You look like you could use it."
Kishuku sat down wearily in the chair beside the door. "I would, but I have to get my brothers and sister off the bus, and pick Yuiren up from day care. Then I have to make dinner and go back up to the hospital to see if my dad needs anything."
Ryuuen patted Kishuku on the shoulder. Chuie is old enough to watch your other siblings while you get some rest. Make pizza for dinner – it's quick and easy – and don't stay at the hospital too late. Your dad understands that you have a job to do, in fact, I bet he would like you to work and make some money instead of worrying over him constantly."
"Gah, you're right as usual, Ryuuen. I'm gonna get home to get my siblings. I'll see ya later." He rose from the chair and waved as he ran out the door.
"Bye Kish!" Ryuuen yelled back. He shook his head sadly. Kishuku's father had very bad cancer and was in and out of the hospital a lot. Kishuku worked nearly two jobs and did other little odd jobs to make money for the family to pay medical bills and use for food. Ryuuen knew how bad it was getting, and he only hoped that Kishuku wouldn't do anything stupid to make some money. Their town wasn't all that big, but it was big enough to have some bad neighborhoods and some bad guys in them.
At precisely five o'clock, Myojuan showed up at the shop for his roses. "Good lord," he commented upon seeing the array. The roses were all long- stemmed, and Ryuuen had placed them in a clear, crystal vase surrounded by white baby's breath. As a finishing touch, he fixed a blood red ribbon around the neck.
"Personally, I think that this rose right here is best," Ryuuen explained. "It stands up higher than the others, and she'll probably see it there before she sees it in any of the others."
Myojuan looked unsure. "Ryuuen, are you sure I should put the anniversary ring in a rose?"
"Definitely," was the reply.
The larger man sighed, then smiled. "Okay. I'll do that. Thanks a million." He paid him and left, whistling as he strode out the door. Ryuuen decided to call it a day and flipped the "closed" sign around on the door and locked it. He placed the more cold-sensitive flowers back in the small greenhouse attached to the shop, made sure the rest had plenty of water, and turned out the lights.
The twenty-one year old lived above the shop. When he had asked Mrs. Leary about renting the bottom level for his flower shop, she had given him the flat rate for the whole building and he gladly accepted it. His prices for the flowers were reasonable, but people always tipped him extra well because he had such a talent for arranging the flowers.
Ryuuen walked up the back steps, feeling stupid for not turning on the light. He had gone up those steps thousands of times, however, and made it to the top without incident.
The word used to best describe Ryuuen's apartment could only be modern. He had gotten creative license from Mrs. Leary to do what he wanted to it... so he knocked down most of the walls until the living room, kitchen, and dining room were all one huge room. Then, he built the center up a level, and turned that into the living area. Everything in the house was red. The couches were red, the carpet on the platform where the couches sat was red, he had red dishes, red accents of phoenixes on the walls, and his bedroom was decked out in red. He had built a bar along the one wall, with blue track lights running along the underneath of it. When he got the apartment, he had busted out the ceiling of the bedroom and replaced it with glass so he could watch the stars at night. The bed, also, was on a platform, and he had beaded door curtains on the door, and along the open closet. In the bathroom, the shower curtain had dragons all over it, there was a dragon painted on the floor, and one on the ceiling.
Ryuuen unlocked his apartment door and stepped over the threshold into a different world. A world where his job as a flower arranger didn't exist, Kishuku's father was not sick but well, and where he had someone to come home to. He loved his apartment, but it was just so damned lonely coming home to an empty place. He sighed, threw his keys on the glass table in the kitchen and opened the refrigerator.
An empty fridge smiled at him. There was a jar of pickles on the door, a dried up peach on the top shelf, and one bottle of water on the second shelf. Ryuuen dropped his head. "Time to go shopping," he murmured.
~~~~
The lights of the grocery store were blinding compared to the dimness of the town's streetlamps. Ryuuen pushed a cart along the aisles, throwing not-so-random things into it.
"Let's see: eggs, check; milk, check; frozen dinners..." he stuck his tongue out. "Check. All I need is soda, juice, and some fruit and I'm done."
He was just hitting the check out when his cell phone rang. People looked around as "Fur Elise" began to play. Ryuuen pulled the phone from his pocket and hit a button.
"What's up, Kish?"
"How'd you know it was me?"
He smiled. "Caller ID, doofus. Wait a minute." Kishuku's voice had sounded weird, strained. "Kish, what's wrong?"
There was silence over the other end of the phone.
"Kish?"
"Ryuuen, I did something stupid."
*Oh, shit!* his mind screamed. "Kishuku... what happened?"
There was a long pause. "I robbed a bank."
Ryuuen nearly dropped his cell phone. The cashier was staring at him impatiently, tapped his foot on the floor, but Ryuuen was ignoring him. "Kish, please tell me you aren't serious."
"I'm sorry, Ryuuen." Kishuku was in tears over the phone. "But, my dad is so sick and I'm not making enough money at my jobs. I got desperate, man."
Ryuuen felt sick. His best friend just robbed a bank? What the hell was he going to do? He threw the money for his groceries at the cashier who glared at him angrily. Grabbing his bags in one and walking out to the parking lot, Ryuuen decided that he would do what he could to help Kishuku. "Where are you, Kish?" he asked
"Oh, no. I am not getting you involved in this, Ryuuen."
"Baka!" he yelled in the phone. "I was involved the moment you called me. Now, where are you?"
Kishuku was silent for a long time. "It doesn't matter. I'm leaving in a few minutes. I have to leave town or I'll be arrested. Good-bye, Ryuuen. Tell Saihitei that I'm sorry." Then, the line went dead.
"Kish? Kishuku? God dammit!" Ryuuen kicked his car in a rage. He stared at the phone, tears of anger running down his face. "How could you do it, Kish?" he yelled. "How could you screw up like this?!"
TBC...
Author's Notes: This is a very different reincarnation fic. It does not center around everyone finding each other and getting their memories back. In fact.. most of the seishi only make minute appearances in this... and it may only be that they remember that they were once part of something else.. I haven't decided yet. But... there will be a lot of shounen ai in this.. so if you don't like shounen ai... don't flame me.. I gave my warning. ^__^
~~~~
The young man worked diligently in front of the window. His fingers and hands were scratched and bleeding, but he barely noticed. Instead, his eyes never wavered from the masterpiece he was creating before him. The colors of red and white and green blended and blurred together, then settled into a beautiful arrangement.
"One last thing... there." The man sighed, sat back, and gazed critically at the work of art that sat on the table in front of him. He reached out and pushed a few pieces in place, then sat back again. A grin broke out on his face, then. "Perfect."
The ringing of the bell above the door to the shop sounded, so he stood and turned. "Hi," he greeted.
A woman of nearly sixty regarded him with a gentle smile. "Hello there, young man. I'm looking for Ryuuen."
"Well, you found him."
One of the woman's well-shaped eyebrows rose in question. "You're Ryuuen Chou? The fabulous flower arranger?"
Ryuuen smiled. "I wouldn't say fabulous, but yeah, that's me. How can I help you?" He held out his hand, and the woman shook it.
"I must say," she told him, laughing a bit nervously. "You look awfully young to have a lot of experience in flower arranging."
The young man sighed. Why did people always say that? He was twenty-one, old enough to drink, drive, be married, and have kids... yet not old enough to be a decent flower arranger. He pushed his purple bangs off his forehead with the back of his hand, realized there was blood all over it. "Umm," he said. "Have a look around. Everything on that side of the shop was done by me. I'll be right out."
The woman nodded, looked around.
Ryuuen walked into the small bathroom behind the counter. As he washed his hands, he saw a few rather deep cuts. "Damn roses," he muttered. "So beautiful, but so damned painful." He dried his hands, made sure he wasn't bleeding anymore. Before he walked out of the bathroom, he looked into the mirror.
He had always liked the way he looked. He was slender, if not too thin, and shorter than most guys liked to be. He kept his violet colored hair short, with the bangs longer in the front. He had a heart-shaped face, with dark purple eyes. The eyes always got people's attention. The smooth, pale skin of his face was flawless, marked only by a beauty mark right below his left eye.
Ryuuen shook his head. He had customers, even if they doubted they talent. He walked back out to the shop, saw the woman admiring an arrangement of yellow Irises.
"Now, ma'am. Is there anything in particular you're looking for?"
She turned when she heard his voice. "Yes, actually. I'm looking for something to give my next door neighbor. She just returned from the hospital today from suffering a near-fatal heart attack."
Ryuuen offered his apologies with a nod. "Is there a specific flower she likes?"
"Oh yes. Rose loves lilies."
"Lilies... lilies..." Ryuuen gazed around the shop, finger resting on his chin in thought. "Oh! Here." He led her over the far right wall, where a series of flowers were sitting in vases.
"I have a fairly wide variety of lilies. Did you want to do all one kind?"
The woman turned to him. "You know, Ryuuen. I hardly know. What would you suggest?"
The purple-haired man smiled. He loved it when people did that. "Well... if she just got home from the hospital, something a bit colorful would be great. Everything in hospitals is white, so I think some color would really brighten Rose's mood. We have a light pink lily.... here." He reached up and pulled a pink flower from one of the high vases. "And..." He grabbed another flower from a different vase. "This blue one I think is absolutely gorgeous."
"Oh, it is. I like that."
"I could do a pretty simple, yet elegant arrangement using these two varieties, if you'd like."
The woman smiled. "I think that would be perfect. Uh, how long will it take?"
"I can do it right now, if you'd like to stay and watch."
The old lady's face lit up. "Truly? I would love to watch you work."
As Ryuuen sat down at the table he used to work, the lady stood off to the side, fascination showing on her face. He first picked out a vase – a white ceramic one with a blue vine running around it that matched the blue lilies – the started placing the flowers in it. He alternated blue and pink lilies until the vase was full, then added some wisps of blue baby's breath. As he worked, the woman watched on. She noticed the rose arrangement still sitting there.
"Wow," she gushed.
"Eh?"
"That rose arrangement is beautiful."
"Thank you," Ryuuen said. "I'm pretty proud of that one. This guy is getting for his wife. It's their one year wedding anniversary."
"If he gets her gifts like that all the time, she'll never leave him," the woman remarked.
Ryuuen smiled. He put the finishing touch on the lilies... a pink bow around the neck of the vase and sat back so the woman could see it.
"Aaaaah," she placed a hand over her mouth. "It's amazing," she said, a few tears filling her eyes. "Rose will love that."
"I think it will really brighten her day and put a smile on her face," Ryuuen said, moving behind the counter to ring the woman up.
She gave him a big tip before she left. "Thank you so very much, Ryuuen. I'll be sure to come back here any time I need flowers."
Ryuuen nodded. "You have yourself a wonderful day, ma'am."
After the woman had left, Ryuuen made a phone call to the man who had ordered the roses. "Myojuan? Hello, it's Ryuuen. The roses are done, sir. Sure, I'll be expecting you then."
He hung up the phone and looked at his watch. Myojuan would be there in an hour. Ryuuen frowned. It was 4 o'clock. Kishuku was always at the shop by now... so where was he?
The door opened, and Ryuuen looked up. A man with blue hair and haunted eyes had walked in. "Kishuku! Where have you been?"
Kishuku smiled weakly. "My dad's in the hospital again, Ryuuen. I've been there since last night."
Ryuuen ran around the counter and gave his friend a tight hug. "Why didn't you call me? I could have come and waited with you."
"Thanks... Saihitei was with me last night."
"Saihitei? Who's that?"
Kishuku grinned down at his friend. "He's the guy who's family is rich. I told you about him. I worked at his house doing gardening work last summer."
"Oh, that's right. I remember now."
Ryuuen's best friend looked at the shop with a frown. "Hasn't Mrs. Leary let you paint this place yet?"
"No... She's still thinking about it. I talked to her on Thursday, and she didn't seem to happy about painting her building." The walls of the flower shop were cracked... the paint was beginning to peel off in places. All in all, the place was a mess.
"How you long you had this place open, Ryuuen?"
Ryuuen blinked at Kishuku's question. "Three years, why?"
He shrugged. "I just thought maybe Mrs. Leary would realize that in three years, a place would need paint. God, you pay her enough for rent."
"Kisukuuu..." Ryuuen said warningly. "My rent is fine. I make enough here to afford this place and my utilities and still be able to pay my car payments and insurance and then some."
"Okay, okay," he sighed. "I'm just tired."
"Why don't you go home and get some rest. You look like you could use it."
Kishuku sat down wearily in the chair beside the door. "I would, but I have to get my brothers and sister off the bus, and pick Yuiren up from day care. Then I have to make dinner and go back up to the hospital to see if my dad needs anything."
Ryuuen patted Kishuku on the shoulder. Chuie is old enough to watch your other siblings while you get some rest. Make pizza for dinner – it's quick and easy – and don't stay at the hospital too late. Your dad understands that you have a job to do, in fact, I bet he would like you to work and make some money instead of worrying over him constantly."
"Gah, you're right as usual, Ryuuen. I'm gonna get home to get my siblings. I'll see ya later." He rose from the chair and waved as he ran out the door.
"Bye Kish!" Ryuuen yelled back. He shook his head sadly. Kishuku's father had very bad cancer and was in and out of the hospital a lot. Kishuku worked nearly two jobs and did other little odd jobs to make money for the family to pay medical bills and use for food. Ryuuen knew how bad it was getting, and he only hoped that Kishuku wouldn't do anything stupid to make some money. Their town wasn't all that big, but it was big enough to have some bad neighborhoods and some bad guys in them.
At precisely five o'clock, Myojuan showed up at the shop for his roses. "Good lord," he commented upon seeing the array. The roses were all long- stemmed, and Ryuuen had placed them in a clear, crystal vase surrounded by white baby's breath. As a finishing touch, he fixed a blood red ribbon around the neck.
"Personally, I think that this rose right here is best," Ryuuen explained. "It stands up higher than the others, and she'll probably see it there before she sees it in any of the others."
Myojuan looked unsure. "Ryuuen, are you sure I should put the anniversary ring in a rose?"
"Definitely," was the reply.
The larger man sighed, then smiled. "Okay. I'll do that. Thanks a million." He paid him and left, whistling as he strode out the door. Ryuuen decided to call it a day and flipped the "closed" sign around on the door and locked it. He placed the more cold-sensitive flowers back in the small greenhouse attached to the shop, made sure the rest had plenty of water, and turned out the lights.
The twenty-one year old lived above the shop. When he had asked Mrs. Leary about renting the bottom level for his flower shop, she had given him the flat rate for the whole building and he gladly accepted it. His prices for the flowers were reasonable, but people always tipped him extra well because he had such a talent for arranging the flowers.
Ryuuen walked up the back steps, feeling stupid for not turning on the light. He had gone up those steps thousands of times, however, and made it to the top without incident.
The word used to best describe Ryuuen's apartment could only be modern. He had gotten creative license from Mrs. Leary to do what he wanted to it... so he knocked down most of the walls until the living room, kitchen, and dining room were all one huge room. Then, he built the center up a level, and turned that into the living area. Everything in the house was red. The couches were red, the carpet on the platform where the couches sat was red, he had red dishes, red accents of phoenixes on the walls, and his bedroom was decked out in red. He had built a bar along the one wall, with blue track lights running along the underneath of it. When he got the apartment, he had busted out the ceiling of the bedroom and replaced it with glass so he could watch the stars at night. The bed, also, was on a platform, and he had beaded door curtains on the door, and along the open closet. In the bathroom, the shower curtain had dragons all over it, there was a dragon painted on the floor, and one on the ceiling.
Ryuuen unlocked his apartment door and stepped over the threshold into a different world. A world where his job as a flower arranger didn't exist, Kishuku's father was not sick but well, and where he had someone to come home to. He loved his apartment, but it was just so damned lonely coming home to an empty place. He sighed, threw his keys on the glass table in the kitchen and opened the refrigerator.
An empty fridge smiled at him. There was a jar of pickles on the door, a dried up peach on the top shelf, and one bottle of water on the second shelf. Ryuuen dropped his head. "Time to go shopping," he murmured.
~~~~
The lights of the grocery store were blinding compared to the dimness of the town's streetlamps. Ryuuen pushed a cart along the aisles, throwing not-so-random things into it.
"Let's see: eggs, check; milk, check; frozen dinners..." he stuck his tongue out. "Check. All I need is soda, juice, and some fruit and I'm done."
He was just hitting the check out when his cell phone rang. People looked around as "Fur Elise" began to play. Ryuuen pulled the phone from his pocket and hit a button.
"What's up, Kish?"
"How'd you know it was me?"
He smiled. "Caller ID, doofus. Wait a minute." Kishuku's voice had sounded weird, strained. "Kish, what's wrong?"
There was silence over the other end of the phone.
"Kish?"
"Ryuuen, I did something stupid."
*Oh, shit!* his mind screamed. "Kishuku... what happened?"
There was a long pause. "I robbed a bank."
Ryuuen nearly dropped his cell phone. The cashier was staring at him impatiently, tapped his foot on the floor, but Ryuuen was ignoring him. "Kish, please tell me you aren't serious."
"I'm sorry, Ryuuen." Kishuku was in tears over the phone. "But, my dad is so sick and I'm not making enough money at my jobs. I got desperate, man."
Ryuuen felt sick. His best friend just robbed a bank? What the hell was he going to do? He threw the money for his groceries at the cashier who glared at him angrily. Grabbing his bags in one and walking out to the parking lot, Ryuuen decided that he would do what he could to help Kishuku. "Where are you, Kish?" he asked
"Oh, no. I am not getting you involved in this, Ryuuen."
"Baka!" he yelled in the phone. "I was involved the moment you called me. Now, where are you?"
Kishuku was silent for a long time. "It doesn't matter. I'm leaving in a few minutes. I have to leave town or I'll be arrested. Good-bye, Ryuuen. Tell Saihitei that I'm sorry." Then, the line went dead.
"Kish? Kishuku? God dammit!" Ryuuen kicked his car in a rage. He stared at the phone, tears of anger running down his face. "How could you do it, Kish?" he yelled. "How could you screw up like this?!"
TBC...