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Confluence - Destiny's Path
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Author's Note: While I totally love the Aoshi/Misao pairing to bits, I started reading a few of the Misao/Soujiro pairings and I felt inspired to write something similar. I've tried to make this seem as realistic as possible, but still make it mushy :) 'Cus everyone likes a bit of cheesy mush every now and then.
I'm starting the story two years after the end of the Kyoto Arc.
Disclaimers: None of these characters belong to me, yack yack yack.
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Prologue
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Breathing heavily Misao stared up at the man she had loved for all of her short life, her heart beating loudly in her chest and her thoughts completely consumed by the Adonis of a man standing with his arms wrapped around her.
In his arms she felt safe, secure and unbearably happy. Not looking at her, Aoshi's arms tightened gently around her small frame and she exhaled a breath of satisfaction as she was drawn closer to him. If only this had happened sooner, Misao thought as she breathed in the musky smell of his gi. Finally, he had acknowledged her feelings for him and despite his silence he wasn't rejecting her.
"Aoshi-sama…" Misao whispered as she softly leant her forehead against his chest and shut her eyes, wanting to savour the moment as much as possible. She had dreamt of this for so many weeks, months, years… She knew that if anyone was able to read her mind they would have told her she sounded like the heroine in some cheesy romance novel, but she didn't care. She was content.
Reaching up and grabbing onto the front of his gi, she tugged him forward, willing him to finally kiss her after all those years of longing and waiting. Following the direction he was being tugged towards Aoshi leant forward and gently brushed her lips with his, sending shockwaves through Misao's tiny body with just that lingering butterfly-soft kiss.
However, Aoshi pulled away before Misao could force him to deepen it. His body stiffened and his expression looked pained as she looked up at him anxiously, not understanding what was happening.
Shaking his head, Aoshi released Misao from his embrace and took a small step back. Misao stared at him with wide eyes as he bowed his head and made his way out of the room wordlessly, leaving her with her mixed emotions and confusion.
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Wiping his forehead and sighing, Soujiro made his way through the small town. The sun was just setting and he could see storm clouds rolling in from the east. He was tired, hungry and in need of a place to stay the night unless he wanted to sleep outside in the rain, which was something that brought back too many memories of the past. Checking his purse, he realised he had only a little money left and that he probably would only be able to afford either a meal or a place to stay the night.
Frowning, he debated with himself about what he was going to do as he unconsciously made his way over to a restaurant-inn called the Ichiriki.
Entering the cool interior of the restaurant, Soujiro smiled slightly and took a sweeping glance across the room. It was a simple establishment and it seemed relatively empty, which was probably why only one waitress was working.
As he surveyed the restaurant, his attention was captured by the waitress and he silently appraised her, taking in the simplicity of her beauty. With long shining black hair and large, honest brown eyes, Soujiro found himself… attracted… to her? An emotion that he hadn't felt before swept over him as she turned around to greet him, an unguarded smile on her face.
"Hello sir, can I help you at all?" she asked merrily, taking in his slightly weathered appearance with some amusement.
Soujiro gaped at her for a moment before holding out his money and asking with embarrassment, "Can I get a room here with this? I don't have very much, but I was hoping it would be enough."
The waitress looked at the few coins before exclaiming cheerfully, "Tell you what, I'll take your money and give you a room, seeing as you look so tired. I'll throw in some free tempura too. Now, if you'd take a seat, I'll go tell one of the other girls to get the room ready."
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Misao sat cross-legged in the training room with her eyes shut as she tried to ignore the drumming of the rain on the roof. Sighing, she opened her eyes and nearly jumped out of her skin when she saw Aoshi standing in the doorway, watching her with his blue-green eyes. Raising an eyebrow as she stood up, she looked at Aoshi challengingly, folding her arms across her chest.
Ever since that day he had pulled away from her, he had been acting hot and cold with her, playing about with her feelings and confusing her to no end. Now she had had enough; she wouldn't stand for it any longer.
"What do you want, Aoshi-san?" Misao asked. Ever since deciding that he was messing with her too much, Misao had stopped calling him by the –sama honorific as a way of showing him how annoyed he was making her.
Aoshi sighed heavily before heading over to Misao and gently grasping her arms in his hands, causing Misao to flinch in irritation slightly. She steeled herself against the familiar sensation of her heart speeding up and her palms beginning to sweat, all symptoms of her feelings for him. She looked away from him and instead focused her eyes on the window where she saw water cascading off of the roof as the rain relentlessly beat down.
"Misao. I owe you an apology," Aoshi stated simply, looking down at her, hoping her eyes would meet his. The tone in his voice caused her to look up. Looking into his eyes, Misao could see a sadness in them which made her realise what was going to happen. Bottling up her tears, she stared up at him defiantly, her jaw jutting out ever so slightly in her indignant rage as she felt her body begin to shake lightly with impending rage.
Aoshi simply looked at her for another few moments before continuing, "Misao. I know that you've… loved me… for a very long time. I acknowledged that a long time ago. I've tried so very hard to make myself believe that I return your feelings, but I realise now that I cannot. I want to give you all the things you want, but I can't. They're broken… Gone… And I can't love you the way you deserve."
By now, Misao had pulled away from his grasp and was staring up at him in disbelief. She didn't want to accept the truth. It was ruining everything that she had dreamed about and she felt as if her heart was breaking as her brain processed his words. She couldn't understand why after all these months of lingering glances and awkward moments he was telling her that he didn't love; despite kissing her several times and leading her to believe the opposite.
Her emotions raged within her as she stared at him, her eyes ablaze with a furious mania, and finally finding her voice she screamed, "You've known this the whole time and you didn't tell me till now?!"
"Misao… I…" Aoshi began, but Misao cut him short.
"I can't believe you've done this to me. I can't believe you have strung me along for all this time!" Misao raged, running up to him and pounding her clenched fists against his chest in fury. Aoshi did not back away, merely standing there and taking her punches before wrapping his arms around her in an attempt to mollify and restrain her. However, this fuelled her anger and she pushed against him, stumbling back with the force she had used.
Wiping her mouth and breathing shakily, she looked at him before shaking her head and murmuring, "You broke me heart Aoshi. I don't think I'll ever forgive you."
"Misao, please don't be like thi-" Aoshi started but once again Misao cut him short.
"No! Don't try and pacify me with lies of being friends with me! I just…" Misao collapsed to her knees and hung her head for a moment before staring up him with tear filled eyes and pointing to the door. Shaking with the effort, Misao rasped, "Get out! I want you out! Out of my life! Don't you dare speak, touch or come near me ever again! I don't want to see you in front of me ever again!"
"Stop being so over-dramatic," Aoshi scolded her, folding his arms across his chest and staring down at her with thinly veiled annoying.
Misao stopped crying for a minute and looked at Aoshi as if she couldn't understand him, her mouth agape as she looked at him in total disbelief. Over-dramatic? She was being over-dramatic?! Even after all this time he still looked down on her as if she were a child, as if he were still Okashira. His condescending expression and the tone of voice he used were all indicative of what he thought, how she was nothing more than a puppet Okashira.
She sat in silence for a minute, looking up at him in disappointment as tears still trailed their way down her cheeks. She sniffed loudly before saying in the most dignified voice she could muster, "Aoshi, you're nothing to me now. You're not a brother, you're not a friend. I don't want to know you or what you do. I don't want to see you at the dinner table, I don't want to see you near my room. If you're going to be hanging around the restaurant with the others, I want to know in advance so I won't be there. You understand?"
Aoshi stood staring at Misao in shock at what she said. He took in the defiant, steadfast glare she was looking at him with and she knew that she truly meant what she said. She was implacable. He hung his head for a moment before nodding slowly, understanding that Misao was giving him an order. Not a request, an order.
"Now get out," Misao told him before she slumped forward and pressed her forehead to the floor, crying silently as her hands moved to cover her ears and blot out the rest of the world. When it finally sunk in that she had cut Aoshi out of her life, she gave out a noisy sob. She sat up quickly and wailed in despair as she felt the gut wrenching pain of reality set in, and she clutched at her stomach before doubling over again and resting her head on the floor.
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The rain beat down heavily on Soujiro as he sat looking up into the sky, tears falling from his eyes as he stared. How he hated the rain. Whenever it rained bad things happened to him. Terrible things. Life shattering events that had carved him into what he was now.
Shifting in his kneeling position and staring down at the girl sitting on his lap, he heaved another crying sob, holding her body closer to him. He had finally found something worth living for. Her name was Kiko. The waitress from the Ichiriki. She had become his life over the past year of having met her. She was beautiful, gracious and woke up so many emotions in him that he couldn't count them all. But she had been ill. Even when they first met she was slowly dying of the incurable illness that had claimed her mother. The western doctors called it tuberculosis.
When she finally knew that her last day had come, Kiko had asked Soujiro to take her outside so she could see the sky before she died, in spite of the rain. It was an odd request, but he complied and carried her towards the top of the hill that overlooked Osaka. It had just started to rain when he had sat down with her on his lap, fighting the urge to shiver against the cold winds.
"I'm sorry, Soujiro," she mumbled softly, not minding the fact that the rain had started beating down on them relentlessly. She couldn't feel it anymore. Death was so close that all she could feel was the comfort of being in Soujiro's arms. Coughing slightly, she swallowed the blood that she had come up before brushing her hand against his cheek, taking in his innocent, boyish beauty.
Pulling her to him tightly, Soujiro whispered in her ear the words that he had been longing to tell her all year but hadn't had the courage to till now when it was too late, "I… I love you Kiko."
"I know that you love me. I've known that for a long time," Kiko said gently, smoothing away the strands of hair that had plastered to his face in the rain. She gently caressed his then soaked skin, her eyes staring up at him lovingly. He was her knight in shining armour; he had helped her endlessly over the last year and in return she gave him her love. She didn't know about his past, but he cared for her and that was enough for her.
"Why did the chicken cross the road, Soujiro?" Kiko asked as cheerfully as she could, bringing up a joke that they used to childishly laugh at, in spite of it's stupidity.
"To get to the other side, Kiko-chan," Soujiro replied sadly, looking down at her and stroking her jaw line gently. He hated the fact that he wasn't able to hold and caress her like this before now, being held back by his unwillingness to taint her with his blood-soaked history.
"I'm going to the other side now, Soujiro," Kiko said peacefully, her hand dropping from his face.
Understanding what she meant, Soujiro's eyes widened and he pulled her to him once more, embracing her tightly as he cried, "Don't leave me Kiko. Please. Stay with me. Stay with me Kiko."
However, Kiko could no longer hear him and said weakly, "Be happy, Soujiro."
With that, she allowed eternal darkness to descend upon her and consume her entirely.
The light went out in her eyes.
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Misao sat bent over the piece of paper as she wrote her goodbye note by the light of a single candle. She sniffled quietly as she wrote, pausing to wipe her tears away every now and then before beginning to write again.
She was leaving. She had no other choice. Aoshi wasn't going to leave the Aoiya any time soon as she had hoped and she couldn't bear to be anywhere near him at the moment, feeling that her emotions were still raw with his rejection. She had spent the last month crying herself to sleep in her room and it was when she heard Omasu and Ochika talking about how worried they were about her, she decided that she needed to take a break. She needed to get away for a while.
Opting to write a goodbye note instead of telling them in person, Misao felt it was for the best. She could imagine how Omasu and Ochika would cry, and how Jiya would angrily tell her off for being so stupidly childish. Yes, she was still a child in their eyes, in spite of the fact that she had been their Okashira for two years. In spite of the fact that she was eighteen.
Feeling more tears fall down her face she ignored them and wrote her letter determinedly, not realising that her tears were blurring the ink slightly. When she was finally finished she folded it up and wrote 'Jiya' on the front in her best hand writing before setting it aside and beginning to pack.
Pausing for a second to look out her window at the city below, Misao felt strange that she was leaving it again. She remembered her wanderings before when she was looking for Aoshi and how she had entertained herself with the notion that he would fall madly in love with her if she found him. They were such naïve dreams; the dreams of a teenager desperate for love.
Smiling slightly, despite how painful those memories were, she continued to pack and by the time she was ready the sun had started to rise. Stealthily moving around the Aoiya she approached Jiya's room and slid the goodbye note under his shoji and started moving to go downstairs, it was then that she noticed something. Turning around, she saw Aoshi looking at her from the balcony across the courtyard.
Standing stock still, she stared at him first with the shock of being caught and then next with a contempt. He had broken her heart and he still had the audacity to show his face to her and make her feel bad for leaving them all without a proper goodbye. His expression remained unfathomable as she scowled at him before turning her back and making her way down the stairs to leave the Aoiya.
She tried to take in as much as possible before leaving the building; the smell of cinnamon, the sight of the courtyard, the feel of the tatami flooring under her feet. I'm going to miss this place… she thought to herself before sliding open the front door and leaving the building quietly.
As she walked down the main street that led away from the Aoiya, she thought about where she was heading. She was sure she didn't want to wander Japan for ten years the way that Kenshin had, but where was she to go? Where would she find open arms? Reminded of Kenshin, she decided that maybe that was where she ought to go to him and Kaoru first. Surely they would welcome her?
"Misao," she heard a deep voice, now noticing that someone was following her.
Knowing who it was, Misao didn't turn around and continued to walk away, not acknowledging his existence. She had nothing to say to him and didn't feel that he deserved any explanation. Hearing him sigh and stop following, she stiffened slightly as she heard him say, "Make sure you come back. Or else I'll never forgive myself."
Angrily, Misao impulsively turned around and hissed, "Stop being so damn selfish all the time! Don't you realise that there are other people except you in the world? You don't realise that your self pitying behaviour affects everyone around you and drags them down too. If you're going to stop me just because you wouldn't forgive yourself if I got hurt, then you can go and stick it. I don't need you. And as I told you before, I don't care about you or what you do."
Whirling back around, Misao stalked off into the night, not allowing herself to cry the tears she was keeping bottled up.
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"Soujiro-chan, where are you going?" a small voice asked behind him. He turned to look at Kiko's younger sister, Mai. She was a miniature version of her sister and looking at her made him waver slightly for a moment before he replied, "I'm… I'm going to keep wandering. Maybe visit an old friend that I haven't seen for a while."
"You're leaving us?" Mai asked meekly, staring up at him with her large brown eyes. Soujiro stared at her sadly for a couple of seconds before nodding. He had no other choice. Remaining in that little town brought back too many happy memories of Kiko and he wasn't quite sure he was stable enough to remain there. The emotions were too much for him, too painful.
Mai sighed sadly before saying, "I'm sorry you have to leave. I know that Kiko would have wanted you to be happy, so if wandering will make you happy, I won't stop you."
Soujiro bowed his head for a second before looking up at Mai and smiling as cheerfully as he could. He hadn't forced a smile on his face for a year and it felt odd to start doing so again, but it was something he could hide behind; it covered up his weakness.
Turning slowly, Soujiro left the village without another word, memories of his brief time with Kiko still fresh in his memory. As he passed various places in town he remembered everything about her with painful accuracy, causing tears to well up in his eyes as memories flooded back to him. How she smelt of sweet oranges, how she loved to eat sweets which westerners called chocolates, the brightly coloured kimono's she wore, her funny way of sneezing several times in a row…
Wiping his tears away before they could fall, Soujiro resolved not to think of her. To put her out of his mind until he reached Tokyo. He had already sent a letter to Kenshin asking if he could stay with him and Kaoru. He had briefly explained the situation with Kiko, something that had been difficult to do without breaking down, and Kenshin speedily replied that he could stay with them for as long as he needed. While he knew that Kenshin wouldn't mind him being there, he had a feeling that Kaoru wouldn't be too happy, but he had promised he wouldn't be there too long.
He just needed to talk to someone.