Author: Uchiha Yumi
Title: Joyless Memories
Genre: Angst
Summary: Another year went by. And Christmas comes. Once again Mildly ItaSasu – Shonen Ai, Incest, Shota
Rating: R
Parings: Itachi x Sasuke
Main Characters: Uchiha Sasuke, Uchiha Itachi
Special thanks: A special thank to Lilya-chan and FunnyNeko, for reading and correcting all of my nasty stuff.
Disclaimer: As sad as it sounds – I don't own them.
Notes: English is not my native tongue, so please, tell me about my mistakes!
JOYLESS MEMORIES
You've already won me over in spite of me
Don't be alarmed if I fall head over feet
And don't be surprised if I love you for all that you are
I couldn't help it
It's all your fault
Alanis Morissette – "Head over feet"
Tic-tac
Tic-tac
Tic
Time flies, fast and luxurious bird with golden wings. Time goes away and slips beneath our fingers, tumultuous stream running towards the sea. Time passes by and rips off our hopes, crushing them, reducing them to shreds and shards – until nothing but dust remains.
Fifteen years after he still sits there, a small box on his knees. A lonely, red strand timidly peeks from the high walls of that narrow container, loosely hanging down the left side of it, almost lifelessly.
Almost, since hot, little breaths keep on coming and going, rocking it lightly, tenderly.
Inside the box – a normal thick, paper box – lies a messy pile of cards, photographs, tiny, forgotten objects belonging to a remote but still present past - pieces of an invisible puzzle never meant to be solved. Big, black eyes softly gaze over that desolate landscape of faraway memories.
Another sigh and the red string quivers. And finally falls.
It was just the same, fifteen years ago. Black eyes looking in the box, expectantly – small, slender fingers avidly dived inside, going through the mountain of papers with pianist-like expertness and elegance. It was Christmas day and snowflakes kept on falling outside the cloudy window.
He loved Christmas. The thousands of sparkling lights, the whiteness on the background, the battles in the courtyard and your breath crushing against the cold panes.
"Wait, Nii-san!"
Sounds of cheerful children chasing each other. Splashing thuds and little whimpers.
"It's cold, it's cold! Wait!"
He turns around, suddenly, his heart racing.
The garden is desert.
No children running. No noises echoing.
He turns back to the little box, his fingers tracing the edges of if – part of a photo emerges, the rest of it hidden beneath a stack of cards filled with sterile, standardized wishes.
There's a snowman printed on the glossy paper – a carrot for his nose, buttons for his eyes and branches for his arms.
Shaky hands reach to gently lift it up and look at it, but they hesitate for a moment.
On the other half of the little image there are two boys hugging and smiling – he doesn't need to see it.
He remembers, because he's one of the boys in the picture.
"Nii-san? What is…a "real kiss"?"
He must have been about six or maybe seven years old when the picture had been taken.
It was the day before Christmas, maybe. Or maybe Christmas day itself, or a few days after.
His father had bought this new camera from a nearby town and the whole family was eager to try it out – except for him, obviously. He had been nervous for the whole holiday, he could remember. Nervous and childish – well, even more than what a 7-year-old could usually be, anyway.
"A real kiss? You really don't know what a real kiss is?"
A fixed thought was buried in his little, child-like mind and was eating him, chewing on his innocent brain like a bug on a yummy leaf. But he had always been the boarded-up kind of kid, one who preferred keeping his doubts to himself if he could.
He had always been a healthy child, too. It was rare to see him laying in bed, especially during Christmas holidays. "Tummy-ache" he had said. Soul turmoil would have been more appropriate, if only he had known that word, back then.
"Really, I don't! They keep on saying…on wishing for this "real kiss"!"
He didn't want to see his mother, he didn't want to see his father. The only person who had been allowed in his room was, of course, a tall and good-looking boy with black hair tied up in a loose ponytail and a sort of melancholic gaze and faded smile. He had sat by the bed and talked him into confessing what was troubling him.
"They?"
A deep blush tinged innocent baby-like cheeks.
"The girls at the Academy"
Cheerful laugh. A faded smile turning into a bright grin.
"I didn't know you were interested in girls already"
"I'm not!"
He pouted so tenderly, with all the pride a chubby 7-years-old kid huddled in his bed could hold.
The older boy smiled, brushing a lock of rebellious hair off his forehead.
"Why do you want to know, then?"
Big, glaring eyes found questioning ones.
"Because"
Beneath that old photograph is a just as old family portrait, still framed in a beautiful, silver border. His hand gently lifts it up from that mess of forgetfulness to better look at it.
Black and white faces, joyful smiles, beautiful dresses. The immortalization of a perfect moment of happiness. But, if he strains his eyes just that little bit more, he can already see red, stinking blood on the background.
He looks at his fingers and sees hot, ruby liquid drying on them – horrified, he drops the picture.
"You could have asked right away. There was no need to pretend a stomach-ache"
"I'm not pretending! Look! Ooooow! It hurts!"
The boy laughed again, looking at that funny, angry face. He wouldn't change his little brother for the whole world now, would he?
A terrified gaze moves down, on the floor.
Breathe deeply.
"Please, please! I surrender! Enough snowballs! Kyaaah!"
He spots something red.
Panic.
He laughs.
It's just the velvety strand from before.
Breathe deeply. Calm down.
It's all gone now.
Joyful smiles turn into expressions of pain, then into mocking smirks. A random paper falls on it like a piteous curtain.
It's all gone…
"Don't laugh. You still didn't tell me!"
Little grin. Expert hands tucking blue covers around a small body.
"Tell you what?"
"You know what! Meanie!"
Expert hands rested there, finding little ones under layers of blankets. He leant over.
Breath mingling with breath. Long locks brushing over peach-like skin.
"You really want to know?"
Innocent gasp of a baby. Rosy lips parted to drink of an intense power, spellbound.
A sense of thirst passed through older eyes. Could lust have such an angelic face?
"I do"
And his consent was sealed.
Inside the little box the frozen little world of memories keeps on carrying on with his immutable stillness – smiling faces, fading ink on old papers. The snowman still peeks from that bizarre position he has conquered over years of passed-by Christmases and rummaged memories.
"With love, your brother" says a card immediately underneath.
Breath on breath again. Lips on lips, soul on soul.
Big innocent irises go wide and stare. A young little heart skips a beat.
Then life goes back to normal. Then life goes on.
Kids are born with the gift of purity and the malediction of someone ready to take it away.
Photographs have the ability to eternalize both such an immaculate limpidness and the ghosts of what's going to be. They provide us memories. And memories are just something more tangible to cry onto.
They stand for our pain when we cannot.
Beside the snowman there is a home-made angel – one of those little things children make at school before Christmas. His wings are broken.
"Well? Now what?"
Tiny, shaky hands traced over those rosy, swollen lips, questioningly.
"Was…that…a "real kiss"?"
"I guess it was. Why are you asking? Don't you trust me?"
"I do…"
He was so cute when he was embarrassed. Those flushed cheeks, his little teeth torturing his lower lip while his eyes stared at nothing in particular. His feelings were as transparent as pure water.
If he recalls correctly, somewhere around that mess there should be also the thing he was looking for in the very beginning – a small ball made of blue glass with the names of the four of them finely painted onto its shiny surface. It was meant to be the "most wondrous" decoration their three had never had.
It was a present he had prepared for that Christmas. The one that never came.
Now it was just a forgotten memory.
Like many others.
He smiled.
"Goodnight then"
The child smiled back.
"Goodnight, Nii-san"
Blushing a little, he leant over and kissed his lips, just like his brother had done before.
The boy laughed, sincerely.
Big eyes of a baby were staring at him with deep admiration.
The kind of admiration you can address to your older, beloved brother and to him and him alone. The kind of admiration that lights up your smile and makes your eyes shiny and watery and makes you hold your breath and think "I wanna be like him. I'm gonna be like him. I'm gonna know everything he knows and do everything he does"
"Don't let mum see you doing that. Goodnight"
And then he turned off the lights.
Forever.
The ball was timidly hidden in a green wrapping.
Fifteen years after he opens it, but just rough, cutting shards welcome his sight.
He didn't recall it to be broken. Not this, too.
Time passes by and rips off our hopes, crushing them, reducing them to shreds and shards – until nothing but dust remains.
A lonely tear gleams on the blue surface of the shattered glass.
Owari