Part 1
By: Tasumi Ashiru
Authors Notes: I wrote this because of all the "let's trash Clow read fanfics" I have seen online. *Sniff* Everyone except online friends label him a bastard. Okay I admit it, I am a Clow fan. This is my idea on a background story of a character who is vital to the series, but is hardly mentioned except near the end to you get a few glimpses at his… humorous and sometimes dare I say insane character. This is not by any means really mentioned in the manga most of the ideas I pulled from my hat and some things that I thought were not really answered in the manga or anime. Such as why Yuki is Yue's false form and other fun little things that we can only make speculations about. Just a small warning.. THIS FIC IS YAOI… if you are scared by Yaoi and Shonen Ai… RUNAWAY, Now this is your last warning in this section. After all... it is a Clow Fanfic… A Clow Read fanfic without Shonen Ai or Yaoi is like hot chocolate being cold… It just isn't the same. It is just my feeling that Clow is either bi or not straight at all. Also… some of the scenes in here are confusing you have to be open minded or insane to understand them. (Insane is better, after all if Clow and Eriol can have voices in their heads… SO CAN I!)
Chapter 1: A Little Boy Named Clow
Bowing his head down, the 8 year old boy began to walk into the house, leaving his mother tending to the garden she worked in all day. Pushing his hair from his eyes, he bent his head up to see his mother sobbing again. "Momma…why did daddy visit me last night?"
"Honey, daddy…" The young boy's mother swiped at her tears, trying in vain to control her trembling voice. She was a young Chinese woman with long black hair and soft brown eyes. She was small in stature but she had such a lovely soft voice, especially when she spoke Chinese to her young son.
"Daddy is dead. I know." Clow sat next to his mom and smiled. "He was in my room last night. He told me to watch out for demons and to study hard in school." The small boy clutched his hands at his sides. "Why did he die?"
"Clow, darling, he was killed a long time ago." Mrs. Read clutched at her apron holding the flowers she was snipping from the garden. Looking down at her only child, she tried to smile.
"Momma, I am never going to die, until I want to. I want to control fate and make the sun rise and set." The little boy smiled up at his mother.
"Clow, no one can do that. No mortal can do such things."
"That's it then. I will become better than mortal." The little boy cocked his head to the side, standing next to his mother.
"Dear, just don't set your hopes too far." Mrs. Read continued clipping flowers as Clow walked back inside, dressed in his Sunday slacks and a white dress top.
Flopping on the large bed in the center of his room, Clow took out a book from under his bed and began to read about astrology. He knew deep down his mother would not understand, even the librarian gave him weird looks over the book he borrowed. Flipping through the pages, he began to take notes in a small book lined with rose scented paper that his mother made for him.
'Everyone in class thinks I am a freak. I could care less. They laugh now, but when I am older, they will learn that I am not a freak.' The little boy continued writing in his book. 'Johnny kicked me at the park, Sissy called me a dork, Alexander kept taunting me during class throwing pieces of balled up paper at me. No one is kind to me in class. I think it is because I am half-Chinese. One of the boys called me a Chink… I don't care what it means, all the kids were laughing. Even my teacher Linda was trying to hide her laughter.'
Clow ripped out the page from his book and balled it up in his small hands and threw paper ball against the wall. 'I hate them!' The little boy kicked his feet off the edge of the bed. Sobbing, he silently wished his mom would come up and tell him everything would be okay.
Mrs. Read stood out side his bedroom door looking in at him sobbing. Parts of her wanted to cry with him, the other wanted to just let him cry. She watched him. After her husband was killed, he was so stoic, holding her hand making sure she was okay. The little boy hardly showed any emotion; he just smiled or stood there.
Walking over to his bed she sat down beside him and ran her fingers through his soft, unruly black hair. "Little one, what is wrong?"
The little boy swiped at his tears and looked up. "Nothing Momma. Just frustrated."
"Having trouble making the sun rise and set?"
"No Momma."
"Talk to me Clow, dear."
"Momma, why are kids mean to me?" Clow blinked his violet gray eyes and smiled.
"Because you are half-Chinese, people are mean to me too. It had to do with the olden days. Now they are just doing it to be mean."
"But Momma, you are so kind. They have no right to be mean to you." The small boy clutched his hands above his head.
"It's just the way things are, my little one. Some people are kind, others are mean. It is the kind ones that will have a pleasant afterlife. Those who are mean will be miserable for an eternity."
"Momma, do you believe that I will make the sun rise and set one day?" Clow sat up sweeping his black hair from his eyes.
"If you want it with your entire being, you will." His mother ruffled
his hair up and kissed his forehead before getting off his bed and walking
out his bedroom, closing the door behind her.
Chapter 2: Momma… (Age 10)
"I closed my eyes to the world around me Momma. The people scare me… Momma, I want to go back home to grandpa in China. I hate it here in Britain. They are still mean to us." Clow folded his arms over his chest, his small mouth curled into the slightest frown.
"Do you think it will be better there?" His mother held her hands against her hips and faced him.
'DO I belong anywhere?' Clow sighed under his breath and dragged his feet against the carpet. "Momma, where do I belong?"
"Honey... why such questions?"
"Chinese kids don't want to play with me cause I am half British. British kids make fun of my eyes and hair. IT'S NOT FAIR MOMMA!" The tiny boy broke down to his knees, wrapping his arms around her legs and nuzzling his soft face against his mother's long skirts.
"My poor dear..." Mrs. Read ran her long fingers through her son's hair and smiled softly. "You will find where you belong, darling."
The boy stood up and smiled slightly. "I know Momma. I just think I will never have friends."
"Clow… what makes you say that…?"
"Because, people are cruel and unloving." Clow folded his hands in front of himself and bowed lightly. "Besides… I will make my own friends who will love me forever, Momma."
"Is that love or servitude?" Mrs. Read knitted her brow and looked at her son.
"Love, Momma… because they will be like my children."
"And what will you name these children?" She smiled, thinking that the young boy had not given it this much thought.
"I will name one Keroberus and make him golden like the sun, and the other will be named Yue, after the moon; he will be a beautiful angel with long hair and pale skin."
"Both boys?" His mother smiled, already knowing that even at 12 he fancied boys over girls.
"Ummn humn, Girls are too troublesome." Clow smirked and plopped himself down on to the floor. "Momma, will you make me a robe… A long one, with a eight pointed star and dark purple and gold accents?"
"If that is what you want… sure." Clow nodded before kissing his mother's
cheek.
Chapter 3: The Sun and Moon (6 years latter - Age 16)
"Mom.." A strong tenor voice filled the large house, as Clow walked into the house. His long black hair was tied back, and replacing his old school uniform was a military school uniform. "Mom… I am back for the weekend."
"Honey, is that you?" His mother rushed out from the kitchen and ran into the tall boy's arms, hugging him tightly. "You have grown so much. I bet you are all the rage with the ladies."
"Nay." Clow shook his head smiling. "Momma, I brought a friend. His name is Yukito Tsukishiro; he's a classmate of mine."
"Welcome to our home, Yukito." Clow's mother embraced him warmly with an all-knowing smile.
"Thank you, Mrs. Read." The pale blond boy bowed his head down.
"Oh, Clow darling, I have something to show you." She grabbed her son's hand and dragged him up the steps. Opening the door to her sewing room, there was a large box seated on the one chair. "Go ahead."
Clow opened the box, to see the back robe and under-layments that he asked for when he was 12 years old. "Mom, they are beautiful." Clow held them up out of the box, admiring the embroidered star on the front.
Grabbing Clow close, she whispered into his ear. "They are for when you make the sun rise and set."
"Thank you mom." Clow smiled to Yukito, who was starring at the beautiful robes in amazement.
"Why do you want robes like that Clow-san?"
"Yuki.. Think about it… they are like the ones psychics and sorcerers wear."
"Oh." Yukito nodded his head. "Is that what you long to be?"
"With every bone in my body."
Yukito smiled softly. "Then I know you will succeed."
Clow smiled softly, looking at his friend gently. "Thank you."
Clow went into the back and tried the robes on. They were loose fitting, and seemed to glow with some strange form of authority and dignity. Mrs. Read smiled at her son, who walked back into the room donning the new robes. "I was going to give them to you sooner, but robes like that would be out of place on a 12 year old boy."
"Mom…" Clow closed his eyes, smiling lightly.
Mrs. Read looked up at the young man and embraced him tightly. "Now
work on the sun rising and setting."
Chapter 4: Tragedy (19)
"In the midst of tragedy, comes forth hope. Everything, while it may be bleak, happens for a reason." The tall minister stood in front of the casket, holding a rosary in his hands as he began to pray.
Clow stood there, stoic as he was at his father's funeral. Holding his mother's hand, they both looked down into the casket. Placing the rose in his best friend's hand, he ran from the church not, stopping till he heard his mother's voice from behind him.
"Dear… Wait … talk to me!!"
"Mom, there is nothing to talk about." Clow spun around facing his mother and narrowed his eyes that were filled with tears that just threatened to fall. "Nothing to talk about, okay..." Clow walked past her, leaving her with tears streaming down her face.
"Honey…" She wiped the tears from her face and looked in the direction he ran. 'Everything happens for a reason. This is the thing that will change the man who you are, into the man you were always destined to become... My son.' Mrs. Read crumpled her long skirts in her hands and walked home alone, praying that her son would be home when she got there.
Clow was sitting at an antique writing desk wring in his journal yet again. This time, the book was about a third of the way filled with small, neatly written letters. Holding the pen in his hand, he smiled softly, 'Something told me you would die before I got the chance to say that I love you, Yuki. It is okay though. I will see you again. I know it!' Clow breathed deeply, continuing the next entry in faster, more hard to read script. 'I have had these visions telling me about the accident, and about things that have been happening. I don't know what to do.. I am afraid that if I open the book of magic.. That I may never be able to close it.'
Clow's mother made it home and leaned against the doorframe, looking in on her son. "Clow, dear?"
"I am sorry I ignored you." Clow bowed his head down. "I had no right to."
"Honey, we need to talk." Mrs. Read sat behind him on the bed an d looked up at him thoughtfully.
Clow put the pen down and looked up at his mother. "Yes.."
"Do you see visions like things that are going to happen but you are not sure… you just have that feeling?"
"Ummn humnn.."
"Come here." Mrs. Read led her son to the attic and motioned to a chest that she never let him go near as a child. "Go ahead. Open it."
Clow opened the box, and inside it was a book. It was about 4 inches thick and had ancient Chinese writing on it. Pressing his fingers against the eight-pointed star in the middle of the book, he looked up at his mother. "What is this?"
"You father, while he was in younger years, was a apprentice to a magician. One day, he and the old man were talking about magic, and the man told your father that his child would be born with a special gift. The magician gave this book to your father. He said that it is only a starting point of magic for you. An outline. From there, you must make up your own rules."
"Do you think I have a gift?"
"I know you have a gift." His mother embraced him tightly and smiled at him.
"Do you think I will make the sun rise and set and.."
"Clow, I know you will do that and more." Mrs. Read smiled at her son.
"After all the Li clan is known for magic, and you are part Li."
Chapter 5: Don't leave me… (Age 25)
Clow walked up into his mother's room; she was bed ridden now. She looked so frail that even the nurses were afraid to touch her. "Mom..."
"Hummn..?" She blinked her eyes slightly looking up at her son. He was now a fully-grown man with soft feminine and masculine features. Instead of wearing business clothes, he was dressed in the robes his mother made him nearly 15 years ago. Clow dropped out of college and adopted magic and fortune telling as his living. While most felt he was a little off his rocker, many people began to see just how correct he was.
"How are you feeling?" He bent over, brushed a strand of hair from her face, and smiled. 'I know you are going to leave me soon.'
"Tired." She smiled weakly. "I am always tired."
"Mom, just rest." Clow sat beside her, his hand sliding into hers.
"Clow, honey. Please let go of me. Let me rest now."
"NO!!" Clow closed his eyes. "You can't die on me too, Momma." A tear slid down his cheek from behind his thin wire framed glasses. "Please don't leave me. I need you."
"Clow, dear. Everyone must die. That is the normal cycle of things. I have had a long life with you dear. But now I am tired. My body and heart ache. Please, my son. Let me go." Mrs. Read clutched her hand at her chest, looking at her son with pleading eyes.
"I.. can't, Momma." Clow leaned over and kissed her forehead. "But if you must.. I understand." 'I always understand.'
"Thank you." Mrs. Read slid her eyes closed as her frail hand slackened in Clow's tight grip.
"Goodbye." Clow rested his head silently against her shoulder, sobbing. After about an hour he tilted his head upward looking up to his mother's serene face. His eyes pink from crying for so long.
The next few days were the hardest, living in the large house that he
stayed in his whole life. He decided to move from England to Japan after
his mother's funeral, deciding it was for the best.