L'amour
Love.
Ryou didn't think he knew the meaning of the word. He had always been too humble to chalk up the feeling to something so...glorified. Love seemed too strong a word, too serious a concept, to apply to someone like him. He was young, he was vulnerable, and he knew the flittery feeling his heart got whenever Bakura was around was simply the result of a teenage heart too easily manipulated by a relationship that was too perverse to qualify as anything even remotely related to 'love.'
And yet, here he was. Here, enveloped in arms that were surprisingly welcoming, nestled against a body that was surprisingly warm. Feeling cold metal pressed against his chest. Feeling warm breath on the top of his head. Cold hands. Warm kisses. So many different sensations at once, chilling him, making his face heat up; causing his heart to skip beats and his eyelids to flicker. Sweet nothings – meaningless whispered words as light as feathers over their heads – and silences that weighed heavily upon them both and conveyed more than words ever could.
Here Ryou stood, as close as one can possibly be to the entity that had singlehandedly torn his life to shreds. The spirit who had used him, abused him, thrown him around, chewed him up, spit him out, stomped all over him, and ruined him. The one who had made him afraid of the horrors the night held, terrified of the demons of the day. The being who saw to it that all his old insecurities, all his former fears rushed back to him and hit like a brick to the head, leaving him dizzy and reeling and unsteady on his feet; who brought back the nightmares of his past and blotted out the light of the future; who stole every happy feeling, every joyous moment, like a cloaked thief in the night, until he was afraid to even think anymore.
The thing was, that thief had also stolen his heart. Snatched away his breath. Robbed him of everything he had, until the only reason he had left to keep on breathing was so the thief may come back to steal his breath once again. He lived solely for his other half; they had, slowly and surely, become irreversibly intertwined. Were they to part, Ryou would have wasted away like a dandelion in the wind. Together, they were complete.
And that, Ryou supposed, was love.
"Je t'adore," he said.
And Bakura sighed, and replied: "Je t'adore aussi."
